


too many legs under the table

by clandestineClairvoyant



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Blood, Character Study, Drinking, F/M, M/M, Multi, lots of smooching, mentions of past dub/noncon, solas is a vodka aunt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-24
Updated: 2016-06-09
Packaged: 2018-04-27 23:02:39
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 34,216
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5068225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/clandestineClairvoyant/pseuds/clandestineClairvoyant
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Solas loses a bet, and has to kiss all the members of the Inner Circle.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Solas looked at his cards silently.

"Well?" Varric grinned as wide as anything, putting his hand on the table facedown. He was the last one in, and Bull, Trevelyan, Dorian, and a blank looking Cole had already folded with various groans of defeat and indignant muttering.

Surprisingly, Cole had almost won with a double, until he'd gotten distracted and showed his hand to Bull to ask what it meant. Then he'd sighed, putting them down on the table with his chin following to rest on top of them, blinking owlishly at the pot. There were some of his very favorite bits of trash in there, which no one had the heart to tell him didn't count as 'stake raising'.

"What do you say? Deal? No deal? You're all out of money, and I'm raising the stakes Chuckles. See this?" One thick finger slowly slid forward, three gold sovereigns glittering underneath them, and Sera makes a small impressed sucking noise through her teeth. "The stakes. _Raising._ "

"You seem fairly sure of your hand my friend." Solas considers, looking around the table. He's stalling for time to consider, and he knows it. Varric knows it. From the way Sera is draped across one large gray shoulder and whispering very quickly into Bull's ear, the others know it as well.

The game had grown heated far too quickly for his liking, but he supposed that was the risk you ran when such strong personalities all came together. He himself was no exception- He perhaps could have refrained from goading the dwarf on _quite_ so deliberately.

"What do you suggest? I'm happy take your gold my friend, but I'm afraid I've nothing left for you to win in the off chance," He smiles faintly. "The _very_ off chance you win.

"Oooh ho ho. I'm sure I can think of something." Varric's smile if anything, grows wider. "It's a time honored Free Marcher's tradition, after all. A favor or task will do just fine. One equivalent to the amount of effort say, three sovereigns might get me?"

_"Free marchers tradition my arse."_ Solas hears Sera whisper, as her and Bull snicker together. Trevelyan seems fairly amused at the whole thing, hair disheveled from his few drinks and purse still comfortably full. He's such a nice, well meaning human. Large and guiless.

Solas is sure Bull went easy on him out of pity in round four; The only reason the qunari hasn't been able to get the warrior naked at the poker table is his guilt at the large, confused expressions the Inquisitor has been known to turn to him or Sera at pranks; Like a mabari that got swatted on the nose. "Makes me feel like he looks." Bull has been known to say, gesturing at an indignant Dorian. _"Dastardly."_

 

"I'll take your bet." Solas finally says, to a certain amount of approval around the table. Perhaps the flip side of so many strong personalities, is everyone can respect courage and daring in the face of uncertain odds. Although, perhaps Solas is simply looking too much into things such as companions enjoying a few rounds of cards.

A few tense, competitive, and often violently ending rounds of cards.

Solas lays out his hand, a pleased twitch of his ears and at the corner of his mouth the only indication of smugness. Three Kings, and two dukes. A full court.

Bull makes a low noise that's impressed, while Sera scoffs and drums her heels against Bull's side from her perch on the railing, practically on the qunaris shoulder. Like a large foul mouthed parrot. "Bollocks! Cmon, clean the sod out Varric. I wanna see baldy do a _hand stand._ " She cackles, showing slightly crooked but very white and sharp teeth. Solas refrains from rolling his eyes.

"Unlikely. On both accounts." He doesn't do anything so tacky as raking in his winnings. A good thing too, as Varric's smile fades to one of satisfaction, hand going to his chest as if he feels the blessings of the Maker being bestowed upon him. Considering how often Solas and Varric found themselves to be the last ones in the game, down to the last coin, it wasn't without consideration. Solas was generally the victor, since as Bull put it, he was about as easy to read as upside down chantry verses in the dark. He feels a faint flutter of uncertainty.

There's a moment of silence while Varric makes a show of arranging his cards, scratching the scruff on his chin, and observing the pot, before Sera finally kicks him in the elbow and he gives in good naturedly to lay his cards on the table.

Solas heart sinks.

Smiling serenely up at them from amongst the gold pieces and small broken pieces of chainlink and feathers that were Cole's contribution, was a ten, a duke, a king, a queen, and the Divine with her radiant inked halo.

Royal flush.

The table erupted into uncouth hooting and hollering and Solas simply shut his eyes, so he wouldn't have to look at Varric's smugly grinning face as he raked in his winnings and winked at him.

_Fenedhis._


	2. Varric

#####

“You would like me to kiss you.”

“That’s correct.” Varric leans back in his chair, winnings jingling cheerfully in his wallet. The dwarf’s radiating an air of smug satisfaction that causes Solas long suffering patience to twang minutely. He's lost much coin since joining the Inquisition, and most of it to the grinning rogue in front of him. Despite most people's belief he'd never been particularly short on funds. His wandering tendencies and reluctance to sleep in anything even resembling a tavern or Inn was more to do with personal preferences, and a distaste for the thin walls of dreamers that are found in such places. The sweaty fumbling imaginings of mercenaries and stable boys hold no interest to him. The _clothes_ that garner so much distaste are practical, never mind Dorian's moaning and complaining, and Vivienne's small, short sniff of disapproval any time he met her in the yard, as they prepared to leave to some city or town in need of their services.

“As well as the members of our dear Trevelyan’s Inner Circle?” Too much to hope that this is some short simply flight of fancy. This is Varric, after all. And he's nothing if not a master of the long game.

“Don’t forget about the advisors.”

“Ah yes, our esteemed leaders. Can’t _possibly_ leave them out.”

“It’s the only way Cullen’s going to get any action at all.” Varric shakes his head mock sadly, drawing another cascade of snickers from Sera at the poker table, where she seems to still be recovering from her fit of giggles across the top of the table, unmindful of the cards and rough wood digging into her back. At least this means she isn’t _under_ it, doing unspeakable things to people’s breeches while they drink.

“I can only assume this brings you some kind of amusement.” Varric nods, and wipes a faux tear from his eye. “May I at least ask what the forfeit would be?”

 

The dwarfs grin grows teeth. “Kissing all the _dogs_ in Skyhold.”

 

“Hm.” Flissa at the bar is throwing them dirty looks, and Solas realizes the tavern has grown empty by the end of their game. He supposes that's for the better. “That does sound about right.”

 

Solas steps forward and catches Varrics chair in one quick movement, using his hand on the back and his foot on the front strut to bring it down to the floor. Varrics teeth snap shut with an audible click and a look of surprise.  
Solas leans forward with one hand on each side of the chair, rough wood and pocked and weather leather, keeping the dwarves arms down. Then he screws up his courage to a very resigned and undignified place, and kisses him on the mouth.

He could, of course opt out by saying a kiss on the cheek should be enough. Or on the hand. Mythal knows what’s going to happen when he gets to _Bull._ Putting up with the grizzled stubble on the dwarf or qunari should be enough of an ordeal to satisfy any gambler. But Solas is nothing if not thorough, and it seems poor sportsmanship not to follow through.

 

Varrics mouth remains closed, thankfully. Solas likes the dwarf well enough, but he’s not sure what he would do with his tongue in his mouth. However Bull is roaring with laughter along with Sera’s mad sounding cackles, and Solas grimly thinks _in for a penny,_ and dips Varric back over the arm of the chair.

He takes advantage of the position to take grasp of his short queue of hair, and tips the dwarfs head by the hand cupping his jaw and get an angle that’s not completely _mediocre_. There’s a rumble of laughter that he can feel tingle the skin of his mouth, and Solas reminds himself that dwarves are perhaps opposite of elves in every respect. Rough, and square, and deep voiced with stone on all sides. Not surprising that the meeting of the two of them should be so choppy, with so many cutting edges and coarse skin and short strong fingers that pinch his side just once.

Solas rolls his eyes.

He tastes like ale and slightly of unwashed skin, and Solas fancies he can smell the dark loamy scent of the earth in the breath he draws across the top of his palate in the few moments their lips are together. It’s not arousing in the _least._ Athough, he admits, it is… _Interesting._

Varric puts up with the ravishing good-naturedly before they separate, him smacking his lips contemplatively, and Solas with the tips of his ears hot and burning cherry red. 

He nods, as if satisfied about something, and picks up his forgotten tankard of ale, draining the last few swallows and swishing it around his mouth like the finest of Orlesian parlor servants.

 

“Well.” He sets the tankard down, and cracks his knuckles. “One down Chuckles.” Sera’s laughter snaps off with a short, sharp, _’Wait, what’d he say Bull?”_ “Eleven more to go.

“Good luck.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> #####
> 
>  
> 
> I laughed so much writing this.


	3. The Iron Bull

#######

 

Bull is perhaps the next easiest.

 

His reputation proceeds him, and Solas is both comforted and vaguely repulsed by the fact that if he’s to be kissing the mercenary, at least half of Skyhold will not be far behind him. Having something in common with the redheaded barmaid pains him to a degree he's sure Varric fully considered and treasured when scheming up this plot.

He goes down to the training fields with bare feet, grateful for the temporary bloom of heat in the air that means he will be able to put off shoes until the very last possible second this season. Even if he does decide to shod himself, generally he will do it with as little material as possible; Linen slippers with hide soles he makes himself, which are disposed of at the first sign of spring thaw.

 

There’s the usual gathering of troops watching Bull bludgeon his own team to surrender, under the pretense of training. Some are leaning on the fence and talking, and some are in the middle of taking instruction from Seeker Cassandra, who’s running them through paces on the mannequins. No doubt at Cullen’s urging.

Bull is in the center ring, the Tevinter team mate of his under assault as he ducks and weaves, trying to keep Bull’s large and sword shaped stick from cracking his skull open. Bull doesn’t pull blows, Solas notes with approval, as a particularly hard hit catches the shield on the edge and flips it slightly out of the other mans grip. At the sign of weakness, Bulls foot lashes out, catching his lieutenant around the knee and dumping him backwards into the cold muck of the training ring, torn up and always barren of grass or sawdust by too many feet.

It looks painful, and Solas can hear the distinct whoosh of breath being knocked out of someone's lungs over the sound of sucking mud and soldiers chatting.

 

The loser pulls a face good naturally, accepting a large grey hand up, and grimacing at the feel of his clothes no doubt sticking in uncomfortable places. Now that Solas is looking closer, he can see the remnants of previous falls. They started training early, he knew, as occasionally the sounds of yelling and weapons clashing made their way to his atrium when the wind was right, and the men were particularly rambunctious.

“Chuckles!” Bull catches sight of Solas, and he tries not to frown at the awful nickname. He probably fails, if the widening of the qunaries grin is anything to go by. “Was wondering when I was going to see you- Go clean off Krem, you’re embarrassing the Chargers.”

“ _I’m_ embarrassing the Chargers?” Krem shakes his head in slight disbelief, offering a rueful little salute to Solas as he wanders off, racking the practice weapons and shield near where Cassandra is beating the fear of the Maker into some hapless mannequins and soldiers alike. Bull turns to Solas and leans against the fence where he’s standing, after watching Krem go large arms folded over each other and steaming faintly in the cold mountain air after his exercise. He doesn't seem in a particular hurry to give up the field to the men and women waiting their turn, and instead lets his eyes roam up and down Solas as he tries not to wrinkle his nose at the smell of sweat and mud and coppery blood where Bull's scraped himself, no doubt on a rock or root buried in the field.

Solas sees him flexing and rolls his eyes.

“Try to contain yourself. You know as well as I that I’m simply here to honor a bet.”

“Sure, sure, keep telling yourself that.” Bull says agreeably, scratching his chin, and showing off his biceps at the same time. Solas is unmoved, but he does feel distinctly disappointed when a few soldiers begin lingering rather too long than racking weapons calls for. If they didn't keep their eyes to themselves, he thinks a little vindictively, they were going to run into a door. “Knew you couldn’t resist riding the Bull- Nice of you to lose though, give yourself an excuse. It’s always the quiet ones.” Bull chuckles.

 

Solas turns away and starts walking.

 

“Hahaha, hold on, wait I’m sorry.” Bull catches up when he’s halfway to the stables, his large footsteps taking one to every two of Solas’ and making short work of the ground he’d gained. “We can make this quick and painless if you like.”

“Yes. I would like.” Solas doesn’t slow his steps, and heads through the small market that’s sprung up in the Inquisitions short stay in Skyhold. Rickety wood and cloth standing where Solas knows lovers once trysted, where kingdoms advisors had conferred, where people had bled and sweated and fought. Now, the Orlesian woman turns her nose up at the elf, and offers a passing soldier some ointment she swears will make his hands as soft as a maidens.

Humans.

“Although…. It doesn’t _have_ to be quick.” Bull ventures, seeming undeterred when Solas makes a short noise of distaste.

“Quick and painless Bull, or it will be neither and I will have to kiss some _other_ , less pleasant livestock.”

 

“I’ll pretend that was a compliment.”

Bull trails behind him like a large misbehaved duckling, and Solas tries nto to feel too ridiculous, leading the man into the stables for a quick and illicit... _Snog_ in what's effectively a _barn_. But better here than in his atrium, or some hall or wing where they may be intercepted before he could get this over with.

 

They enter the stables, and the smell of sweet hay and animals prickles Solas nose. He knows it’s probably stronger to Bull, who takes a deep comforting breath, and pats a horse on the flank as the only stablehand present that day brings it out to the paddock. The man throws Solas and Bull a curious look, before leaving them alone.

Solas notices his particularly favorite hart in one stall, and offers it a pat as it stretches it's neck out to mouth at his robes sleeve.

"Quick and painless." Bull reminds him, and Solas turns with a sigh.

 

And then Bull’s hands are on his shoulders, and pushing him gently back until he’s against the rough wooden planking. Solas looks up, and up, and _up_ , and thinks the view is one that many would find appealing. Large broad shoulders that block out the light, one eye that conveys nothing of the thoughts happening behind it, beyond an interested glitter that’s full of much more intelligence than people expect or presume. Solas may make comments, but he knows the qunari is no fool. Perhaps he’s the least foolish of all of them, he sometimes muses, as they're trailing behind their illustrious leader on the way to some battlefield or ruin where they'll no doubt run into every ill tempered creature between here and Orlais.

 

And then one large thumb is on his chin, and Solas knows he’s making face as bristles scratch the delicate skin under nose. And then Bull's kissing him with slightly chapped, thin lips. He smells like oil, the kind that is scented with herbs from Seheron, and sweat from the training ring. There’s also the underlying scent of warmth, and Solas thinks of qunari and their hot blood and horns and the flash that Bull’s eyes get sometimes in the dark light of a cave, so similar to Solas own, and echoed by the many faceted eyes of the cave spiders over slavering mandibles. Perhaps there _is_ fire in qunari blood. Stranger things have happened.

 

Solas enjoys kissing. It’s an art, and it’s elegant when performed properly. Although he’s never felt the strongest inclination to the male body, he’s not dead either. And Bull is good at what he does for a reason, and that is because he’s practiced, and skilled, and sharply bites Solas mouth when he pulls away slightly to breathe, lighting a spark in his skin that causes his ears to lay back in a way that will embarrass him later.

His neck grows slightly hot, and Bull presses against him, the wood digging into his back and his satchel strap tightening as Bull moves it out of the way so his hand can rest against Solas' middle, large and rough.

And then he’s biting back, ignoring the sudden rushed sound of their breathing as Bull’s large tongue sweeps in along his sharp teeth and Solas resists the petty urge to draw blood as he allows it, enjoying the sensation of someone being close in a way only people can, as well as the feeling of a large hand suddenly petting down his side like a large and heavy blanket. The same way it had stroked the horse earlier, he thinks distantly.

 

Solas is mortified to think of how far it might have gone, before there’s a sudden awkward cough, and Solas comes to his senses to gently pushes Bull back, slapping Bull’s wandering hand rather more sharply. His ears flinch at the moist noise their mouths make as they separate, and he narrows his eyes at Bull’s disappointed groan.

“Fuck, Blackwall, you couldn’t have waited just _ten more seconds._ ”

 

“I assure you, I could not.”

 

The Warden is standing with his horse, and Solas is amazed he didn’t hear the human come in. He’s also blushing a bright cherry red over his beard, and Solas interrupts his observations long enough to slap Bull’s wandering hand. Again.

 

“My apologies Blackwall. I’m settling some debts, and perhaps could have chosen a better… Location.”

Blackballs eyebrow raises, and he looks from the grinning qunari to Solas with a slight concern. “Something I should be talking to the Inquisitor about?”

“No, he’s aware. And… on the list.”

 

“Ah. That kind of debt. I see Varric finally got you.”

 

“Yes. Although I feel he’s being rather more unfair than I would have in his position.”

 

“You’ve got a mean streak in you as wide as you are tall, I’m sure you woulda thought of something.” Bull reassures him, clapping him once on the shoulder and almost knocking Solas down. “Well, it’s been fun, but I’m guessing you have some business to take care of with Blackwall here, so I’ll just be going.” Blackwall looks slightly dumbfounded, and if anything blushes even brighter. “Hit me up if you ever change your mind Solas.”

 

“I won’t.” Solas replies without looking, eyeing the human in front of him with the air of someone facing a meal they didn’t particularly like, and had to finish all of.

 

The stable door shuts, and Solas prays briefly to some deity he doesn’t feeling like naming specifically for strength, as Blackwall coughs into his fist again and his horse nudges the door to it’s stall plaintively. _Fenedhis._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> #####
> 
>  
> 
> hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha


	4. Blackwall

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since it's november, I'm going to try to write everyday! So you guys get a new chapter early. It was surprisingly easy to write, so we'll see how long _that_ lasts.
> 
> Give me prompts at clandestineclairvoyant on tumblr, or just pop in to say hi! I love all your comments and kudos, they make me smile and bring the chapter fairy early for all the good boys and girls.

#######

 

Solas sits silently and composes himself while Blackwall puts his horse away, giving the dark grey animal an affectionate pat on the nose and an apple from his pocket. It’s one that he take out often, a well tempered mare that’s trained in Blackwall’s rather specialized tactics. It’s hard to find a horse that won’t shy when facing down a red behemoth, or rear at the first scent of dragon.

Solas is more or less in order as Blackwall fusses with the buckles and satchels on the mare. He frowns and adjusts his robe where his strap had caught it, and shaking his head in puzzlement at a few catches on the front that had been undone. Impressively, Bull had to have done it one handed, and he finds himself rolling his eyes yet again as he does them back up.

The man is amazingly talented at testing his patience, even when he wasn’t present.

 

“So I’m guessing this bet has something to do with why Bull had his hands practically down your trousers.” The warden starts hesitantly, racking his saddle and bags, and clinking companionably about the stable. He unloads his small kit from the bags, one he takes when scouting around the Hinterlands when Trevelyan wasn’t in need of his services, or when he took the horses out for that specific training that was so hard to instill in Champion mounts. He’s at home here, Solas can tell, by the easy slope of his shoulders, and the sure way his hands don’t fumble for things on the workbench.

There’s a few carved knick knacks about, and Solas notes that while rough and unpracticed, there’s promise in the strokes of the bevel, and the small intact curls that litter the sawdust floor. It turns what amounts to a public space to a domain where Blackwall’s comfortable, and Solas feels briefly guilty for invading it in such an abrupt manner. Privacy was important.

 

The Warden kept to himself for the most part, but Solas was familiar with someone who had a secret. Something that wouldn’t stand up under any more intense scrutiny than a distant wave and a hello, or perhaps a tent out in the field and sharing boot space. The Warden played his cards close to his chest, and it was only the camaraderie of young Trevelyan that he’d opened up at all.

Solas wasn’t sure if it was a thing humans did, the sweating and shouting and bonding over large amounts of bodily violence. After all, after sex and dragons, that was their resident qunaris favorite things, and he was as far from human you could get without being an emotionless automaton from the Seheron. However their Inquisitor had proven most able at prying reluctant comrades out of their shell, mostly through this unpleasant and entirely unappealing methods. There was more drinking than Solas would expect, for someone raised in a chantry.

_”I myself am a fine example of being pried from a shell.”_ He thinks ruefully. For sure, he never would have been in this embarrassing and rather ridiculous set of circumstances if the large friendly Templar hadn’t started badgering him to join their games, citing them as mandatory for team morale. All while his eyes twinkled playfully, and he roughhoused Solas on the way through the tavern and tested his long stretched patience.

Normally Solas wouldn’t stand for such silliness. But, something about the Inquisitor caused the older elf to be indulgent. Perhaps it was the mans youth, barely out of his teens and already with the weight of a whole religious movement on his shoulders.  
Solas truly felt his years then, when he saw the young man standing tall out in the field and giving orders, the ravages of lyrium addiction yet to sink it’s hooks into his well being, and even the Seeker acquiescing to his sharp commands and tactical strategies.

The years stretched out behind and ahead of him as he watched him learn to amass his power and his influence, and Solas would sigh, and simply follow the young man wherever he wished.  
Whether it was to sharpen his antlers against the Abyssal High dragon like an eager young buck, the bulk of their army left on the hills behind them to watch with shaking heads; Or simply to the tavern where he would have Solas keep him company, while Varric and Sera took all his coin and Bull tried to get him out of his shirt.

 

Blackwall looks over at him, and Solas realizes he was quiet for a few moments thinking of how he got himself cornered by the well meaning dwarf, and he shakes briskly as if to get an irritating bit of water out of his ears.

“Apologies. I was simply thinking.”

 

“Bull tends to have that effect on people, I’m sure.”

 

“I wouldn’t flatter him so highly.” Blackwall snorts out a laugh. “But true, there are things on my mind. Some pertaining to the… Situation you witnessed.”

“No need to explain. Varric’s been plotting this for months. The way he tells it, this is as much to punish Sera as it is you, so i wouldn’t take it too personally.”

Solas frowns. “I do not have to stretch my imagination too far to guess _that._.”

“So.” A moment of silence where the horse crunches it’s apple happily, and the distant sound of the training field drifts in through the thin barn walls. “I’m not usually one to… _Coerce._ ”

Blackwall’s been making an excellent effort, but suddenly his face flushes again, and Solas is oddly charmed to see how red his cheeks grow under his beard. The human is a surprisingly easy book to read, for someone who refuses to have much to do with his companions outside of combat. “I would know that you’re not being taken advantage of. I can have a word with Bull if he’s making you uncomfortable-“

“A true champion.” Solas says drily, and Blackwall gives him an exasperated look.

“ _Yes._ It’s all fun and games until someone takes it too far. It happens often in armies where stress is high, and maybe there’s too much drink.”

Yes. Definitely charmed. “I’m touched. But rest assured I don’t make bets I’m not willing to follow through on. And kissing is the _least_ offensive thing about this whole situation. I would kiss the whole army, if I thought it might get me back at Varric somehow.”

“Well. I guess you can just settle for me at the moment. I’m sure the rest of the army would make time if you _wanted_ -“

“Stop talking now or I may lose my nerve.” Solas threatens, although he’s smiling faintly, and Blackwall chuckles.

 

“Alright.”

 

Solas steps forward and puts a hand on either of Blackwall’s shoulders, looking him over for a moment. He supposes he’s lucky most of Trevelyan’s companions are handsome in their own way; Although if Solas has to kiss one more beard he’s going to need to start looking into that ointment the Orlesian stall keeper is selling.

But then the thinks of the look on Varrics face if he heard _that_ puts it firmly from his mind, and resigns himself to enduring beard burn for the first time since he was young, and adventurous, and more prone to indiscretions with close friends.

 

Blackwall ducks forward as if to kiss him, and stops unsurely, face bright red and eyes firmly fixed over Solas’ shoulder.

 

He waits with an amused smile.

 

“I’m beginning to think that the proper question here is whether _you_ are uncomfortable.“ He finally says, after waiting a rather patient amount of time for the human to gather up his courage. He’s trying to be gentle, since the way the human is standing he seems ready to startle at any sudden movements. Blackwall barks out a short laugh as he realizes how ridiculous he’s being, and looks sheepishly apologetic.

“Er, yes. It’s fine. I simply don’t find myself kissing… _Men_ very often. Let alone elven men.”

“What a coincidence.” Solas arches one eyebrow at him, and looks pointedly at the hand encircled lightly around his wrist. Blackwall’s still wearing his riding gloves, and it’s a single point of intimacy that isn’t enough to make him blush, but makes him conscious of how close they’re standing.

It seems to remind Blackwall as well, and he coughs briefly off to the side, clears his throat, shuts his eyes, and while Solas tries not to laugh, kisses him very firmly on the mouth.

 

Of course it’s prickly, and smells like horse. Not the best of kisses, as kisses go, but the pressure is firm and it’s not _wet_ , and Solas supposes the beard might be interesting in it’s own way in other circumstances.

If Bull heard him think that the qunari might _swoon._

The humans mouth remains firmly closed, but he does put the hand not circling Solas’ wrist on the small of his back, and to Solas’ intense amusement dips him slightly, if instinctively. Like he’s some Orlesian maid at a ball, or a stable girl being swept off of her feet in the sweet smelling stalls. Or whatever other fantasy Blackwall’s telling himself, so he doesn’t have to open his eyes and see Solas trying very hard not to smirk against his mouth.

 

After a few moments, Blackwall pulls away and laughs slightly, letting go of Solas’ wrist and stepping back. Solas moves his mouth and grimaces at the slightly red itchiness he knows will be there. Both from kissing Bull, and now this most recent indiscretion. He hopes whoever he manages to corner next is at least a _woman._ Or _shaves._

 

“I trust our business here is concluded?” Blackwall’s beard twitches faintly in a smile, and Solas returns it, patting him companionably on the shoulder and stepping out of the half cage of Blackwall’s arm on his back.

 

“Yes. Excellent doing business with you.”

 

Blackwall’s disbelieving chuckle follows him all the way out to the yard, until the stable door shuts behind him.


	5. Vivienne and Josephine

########

 

Solas knocks on the door to Ambassador Montilyet’s study, feeling a faint fission of anxiousness at the soft sound of harps and one faintly ringing tambourine. The noise continues unabated, but he hears the clear and singsong accent of the Ambassador telling him to come in, so he does.

 

The Ambassador is perched on her desk, long and golden skirts hitched up slightly to show small golden slippers with winking pearls catching the bright fadelights. They’re floating above their heads, a familiar standard circle spell that causes Solas’ lip to faintly curl. Simple wisps, and only a fraction of their potential.

They do give off a lovely warm glow, and it’s clear that that is the point. One of the small elvhen servants is seated in the corner with a lute, her long black hair pulled back under a scarf and looking distinctly relieved not to be scrubbing the kitchens, or bringing Varric his latest mysterious package and fetch and carry request.

Vivienne is holding court, herself and a number or higher Skyhold servants, as well as a relaxed looking Josephine. It's uncommon to see the ambassador so relaxed, but Solas notes a few empty glasses on the sideboard, as well as a distinct lack of papers on the desk, and puts the clues together. With the looming threat of Halamshiral, and grumbled complaints of the Madame's tyrranical warpath on the uneducated hordes of the Inquisition on the art of dance in the servants halls, Solas quickly realizes the reason for his requested presence.

It has an air of informality that Solas isn’t entirely used to from the Knight Enchanter, and she claps as soon as she catches sight of him lingering in the doorway.

 

“Solas, my dear, do come in. I would ask you to take your shoes off, but I’m afraid you seem to have left them somewhere.”

 

The head sommelier with distinctively red hair stifles a small laugh, and then looks mortified when Solas blinks at her serenely. She’s sitting with two others on the small couch in the corner of the study; A man Solas recognizes as a personal servant of the Inquisitor, who’s looking distinctly uncomfortable in his seat between the other two women, and one of Josephine’s ambassadors in training.

The woman is rivainni, with an elegant coif of braids piled in her head and a distinct reputation around Skyhold for always looking put together, no matter the weather of the emergency. Common rumor in Solas’ tower is the woman hadn’t had a single nail out of place when Corypheus forced their retreat, and had helped to reinstate many a noble ladies wardrobe using nothing but fairy floss and secondhand curtains.

He approves of the choice in students, but he’s not entirely sure what’s supposed to be being taught today.

 

“You requested my help, Lady Vivienne?” He steps in and shuts the door, and stands at the edge of the cleared space in the center of the office, leaning his staff against the desk. Josephine props it up helpfully, and gives him a bright smile.

“We are learning to dance today.” Vivienne explains, gesturing to her students. “And I am embarrassed to find that we seem to be short one male lead. You know how to waltz, I trust?”

 

Solas arches an eyebrow at her. “I do.”

 

“Excellent. Then we shall begin with the Orlesian four step. Myrcella, the music if you please.”

 

Vivienne claps sharply, twice, and the lights above them flare up ever so slightly, as the clear high notes of the harp start to quiver through the air. The girl is talented enough, and Solas offers her a small smile as he turns to Vivienne, who stands ever so slightly sideways, and put’s a foot out, bowing with an elegant twist of her hand, which Solas returns with one hand over his heart, and the other in a similar motion.

As Vivienne stands back up and offers her hand across the distance between them, he catches the faint smirk under her mask, and returns it with a carefully neutral expression.

 

“I suppose Dorian was too busy to help you?”

 

“Mm.” She hums in agreement, as the music strikes the beginning chords and they start to drift slowly together and around. “If by busy you mean he called me a relentless taskmaster, and holed himself up in the tavern, then yes.” She puts one hand on his shoulder, light as a birds wing, and Solas puts a gentle pressure on her hip, taking the lead effortlessly, and gently stepping around the sharp, high heeled danger of the Enchanter’s shoes.

“I suppose this isn’t your first lesson in dancing then?”

“My fourth batch of students, and hopefully they won’t be as completely deplorable as the last. Stephan, eyes forward, you will be leading a majority of the time, and I will not have you be an embarrassment to the Inquisition.” She takes the fourth measure steps, the song dwindling down slightly to give them time to step apart, hands coming up.

 

Solas hasn’t danced Orlesian in quite a bit, but he finds it easy to remember the steps. A simple, geometric affair with rules and tips that make it easy for even the most simple of elvhen children to scoff at, in comparison to their complicated, energetic affairs.

The People have always been light on their feet, and it’s not too much of a stretch to turn that natural born grace to dancing. They used to be such a musical people.

 

“Attention Solas.” Vivienne leads him through a complicated set of steps, and pauses, snapping her fingers sharply, and gesturing at the shy Myrcella to play the chords again. “Are you paying attention Isolde? Watch, _two, three, two, three,_ and _one…._ ”

Solas twirls her obediently, and the two drift together again with their hands on hips and shoulders as easily as stars migrating, and Josephine offers a brief laugh and clap of her hands.

“Messere Solas, I never knew you were so talented. Why have we been putting up with verbal abuse from Dorian again, Madame de Fuer?”

 

“Because Varric is too short, Blackwall too shy, and Bull would crush poor Stephan I’m afraid.”

 

“The Inquisitor as well?” Solas asks with a smirk, as they move on into the last steps, the music turning slightly faster, and their motions only stepping up a half step. Vivienne’s keeping it slower than it would be, he can tell, so that the students can watch and learn.

“The poor dear means well, but I’m afraid it’s like trying to dance with a mabari.” Solas dips her lightly as her voice drops just the slightest bit in conspiracy. “Which has three left feet, and a club foot.”

Vivienne sighs, and they finish with a flourish, both retreating to their respective sides, and bowing, before emulating a switch in partners with a brief twirl, and another brief applause from Madame Montilyet.

 

“Excellent form! I don’t know why we didn’t ask Solas before.”

 

“Because he won’t dress the _part_ , dear Josephine, and I’m afraid I can only put up with the offense to my senses for so long before I’m forced to remove myself from the room.” Sniffs Vivienne.

 

“Please. Don’t leave on my account. I’ll just be on my way. I’m sure I saw Bull lingering around the tables, I’ll just send him in after he’s done with his leg of lamb-“

 

Vivienne rolls her eyes and snaps a finger sharply at Stephan, who jumps to attention like a druffalo with a bee sting on it’s rump. She has them trained well, if the snap of her fingers draws _that_ kind of a reaction. “Don’t be so soft my dear, you’re our best lead yet. Don’t tell Dorian I said so however.”

“I’m sure he’d rather be lead _by_ , anyway.” Josephine notes with a charmed smile, and Vivienne’s mouth quirks up as well.

“Mm. Yes, our dear Inquisitor is quite infatuated, isn’t he? It’s darling. Now, Myrcella, on my count at half speed, _one, two, one, two,_ and _three_ Stephan, are you even keeping _count?_ ”

Solas barely avoids crushed feet, and gives the large human an irritated look. He seems sheepish enough, and Vivienne’s disappointed flurry of sighs is enough to terrify anyone into obedience. The next round is slightly better; Solas pretending to be led while subtly turning by his elbows, and going slow enough to make up for the large humans fumbles.

Vivienne takes him next, and Josephine supervises with a straight rod on the small of the man’s back.

Solas leaves them to it, and offers a hand to Isolde, who’s braids twinkle faintly with the small sticks piercing the elegant twists of hair. She smiles and accepts, and Solas draws her through the steps slowly.

She picks it up quickly, and it’s not too much of a tedium to show her the careful, counting steps while Josephine and Vivienne take turns bullying Stephan into being an acceptable lead. The sommelier sits and observes, and when it's her turn, seems to have picked it up from the longer period of observation than the other two, although she's the last of them to step on Solas foot, and he grimaces.

 

By the time the lunch bell is ringing in the distance, Solas’ feet are sore, and Vivienne has run through her endless patience and sent the students on their way with sharp words and a note to return the next day.

 

“They were not entirely hopeless. For humans.” Solas notes, and Vivienne must be in a better mood than she’s conveyed, because she smiles like she heard something amusing and asks,

“Oh? For a human? And I suppose elven dances are so much more complicated then?”

 

Solas senses an opportunity, and carefully keeps his face blank and measured.

 

“Why, of course they are. Much faster, much more elegant. As well as less likely to crush feet.”

 

“Hm. Myrcella?” The elf looks up in surprise, her hands resting in her lap and harp set by her feet on it’s silk cushion. “I don’t suppose you know the tune?”

Myrcella looks at him uncertainly, and Solas gives her a brief reassuring nod. “ _Hallaviran,_ , perhaps?”

The girl nods, and looks at Vivienne and down at her fiddling hands, before beginning to strike the tune.

 

It’s a common enough song, for feast days and birth celebrations. A tune that you can dance to, although most elven dances are entirely unscripted and half improvisation.

He’s hoping that the two women don’t know that however.

 

“It’s simple- Two steps, a clap, and-“ He runs through a common enough series of steps, involving rather more bending at the knee than humans are used to, and a brief spin. Josephine makes an impressed face over her hand, as she demurely hides the flash of teeth that results from Solas’ rather extravagant motions.

“Hm.” Vivienne observes for a few moments more, as Solas improvises something that’s dignified enough for the Enchanter, but not so ridiculous that Myrcella in the corner grows uncomfortable. As it is, her chords have only faltered the slightest bit, and she’s throwing Solas shocked looks and uncertain glances.

He lets his mouth twitch just the slightest bit as Vivienne attempts a few certain, practice steps. Myrcella catches the slightest tilt and shake of the head, and to his relief she smiles the slightest bit and looks down at her fingers on the strings, so as not to give the game away.

 

_’Halam’sha.’_ He thinks silently to himself, turning his attention back to Vivienne as she executes a few certain twirls.

 

Solas enjoys the Knight -Enchanters company. Despite the disparaging comments of his wardrobe, and her firm belief in the safety of the Circle and the strict adherence to rules that plays a havok on Solas’ own sensibilities, they share a quiet companionship when out in the field that Solas finds hard to find anywhere else in the Inquisition.

He enjoys Coles company of course, as he’s such a gentle inquisitive creature. Dorian is well enough to chat with, although he finds the man’s attitude and negativity grating on occasion.

But Madame Vivienne is a woman of character and grace that’s admirable in any situation. Her insights into magic and politics is intriguing and well thought out, if a bit trying at times. They snip at each other in an antagonistic way that’s perhaps a bit more honest than he would otherwise be with Bull or Varric, who’s personalities and traits he can appreciate, even if he doesn’t entirely respect them in the way he would a colleague, or fellow mage.

But Vivienne is a comrade as well as a colleague, and as well matched as they are in both power and class, their interactions are a well maintained dance of checks and balances and antagonistic remarks on their respective abilities that keeps the both of them on their toes. It's rather nice for once to be literally dancing, than metaphorically.

 

He respects her, and although this small bit of deception sits ill with him, he knows that there’s a girl encased in this woman’s heart of ice that would find the trick delightful. Perhaps the same girl who he heard once from Dorian, turned an entire marble fountain in the girls lavatory at school into ivory soap.

 

“And this is a common dance?” Josephine enquires, as Solas leads Vivienne through a whirl of steps, before trading partners, and collecting the Ambassador along the way. She gasps in quiet delight, and Solas offers her a charming smile.

Vivienne stays on the edge, observing, as Solas gently walks Josie through the same steps.

“Common enough- Mostly done with friends, as the end is a bit intimate. Although very traditional.” Solas explains, twirling the ambassador, and catching her up again. Both women are rather taller than him, but as most elvhen dances require no gender roles, t’s no large amount of trouble to change the steps ever so slightly.

As long as Myrcella doesn’t give the game away, he can strike two comrades off his list in one afternoon.

“Traditional?” Josephine enquires, flushed slightly under the fade lights Vivienne has yet to remove. They _do_ make the women outfits look rather fetching. The glitter off of the silks of Josephine’s skirts, and the glint off of Vivienne’s mask and arched collar.

“Intimate?” Vivienne asks in the same beat, giving him the slightest suspicious look.

“Mm, indeed. As I’m sure you know ambassador, the elvhen culture is an intimate one. The dalish share aravels amongst many family groups, and pass children from knee to knee as easily as one would pass a book to borrow. A kiss at the end of a dance is only traditional.”

 

The slightest hitch in tune is completely unnoticed by the humans, but Solas ear picks up the slight dissonance, and he struggles to see his face straight.

 

“Messere Solas, I am always eager to learn the traditions of different people, as I’m sure you know.” Josephine says in a placating way, although Solas notes that her cheeks are very flushed, and her hands have tightened on his shoulder. “It would be no trouble at all. I’m sure you are very homesick, being away from your people.”

“I have never been one of the Dalish, Madame Monilyet, and have never craved the company of others, as I’m sure our Madame de Feur would be happy to tell you at length.” He spun Josephine one last time, and turns to Viivenne, offering her a brief bend at the knee, and taking her hand next. “However the traditions of our people are time honored, and I’m always happy to educate the Inquisition’s political vassals.”

Vivienne smiles good-naturedly, and allows him to draw her out again, him playing two sides of a dance with half the leading roles.

He’s starting to suspect she knows.

“Yes. You never know when a time-honored elvish tradition will come in handy. Tell me Solas, how old _is_ this dance?”

“Oh, _ancient_ , Madame de Feur.” Solas returns with the same degree of solemnity.

 

The music draws to a close, and Solas dips Vivienne one last time, counting out the beats and feeling quite daring; And at the last note, kisses her very firmly on the mouth, drawing a string of giggles from Josephine that causes Myrcella to cough into her fist.

 

“Quite the dance my dear.” Vivienne says as they share breath, and Solas barely refrains from laughing. It’s almost like a fairytale, and he feels like he holds something very dangerous and beautiful in his arms under the lights that she’s conjured.

Something that’s cold and icy and beautiful, in the same way a silent mountaintop is; right before the smallest bit of tension causes the whole thing to heave and destroy an entire township in a roar that rivals a hurricane.

 

But if she’s offended she shows no signs, and simply pats his arm in an indication that she would like to be let up.

 

“Certainly better than the _orlesian waltz_.”

 

He returns her to her feet, and turns to Josephine. She’s blushing a very fetching plum, looking up and putting her hair behind her eyes in a hurried and shy gesture that Solas find very endearing. Her other hand plays with her skirts nervously in a rustle that she perhaps doesn’t realize is quite so noticeable in the absence of music.

“It’s traditional Madame Montilyet, I’m sure you understand.” He consoles her, stepping up, and drawing her hand towards him, so he can bow over it with one foot behind him, as graceful as any chevalier.

“O-Oh! Of course it is, I would hate to offer insult!” She leans in, eyes darting to look at whatever expression Vivienne is showing her over his shoulder, and he simply pecks her briefly on the lips. A chaste and comfortable kiss that he’s sure is less intimate than any brush of lips she’s had from strangers in Antivan parlors.

Perhaps it’s the romantic lights, or the dancing that has her so flustered, Solas muses, giving the two human woman a tip of his head, and giving Myrcella the briefest incline of his head that has her looking studiously at the ceiling and smiling faintly.

“I shall see you tomorrow, I trust?” Vivienne calls after him, studying her nails with a disinterested air.

 

“If you still require my services, or course.” Solas replies, although his heart sinks faintly with one foot out the door.

 

Vivienne smiles at him, and it’s positively serpentine. “I’m afraid poor Stephan will never get the leading steps unless I direct him, so I’ll be having the Iron Bull join as your partner tomorrow. I trust it will be no problem?”

 

Solas shuts his eyes, before opening them and smiling. It’s strained. “No problem at all Madame. Until tomorrow.”

 

“Mmm. Tomorrow then.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have a lot of trouble writing Josephine! Sorry for any inaccuracies or injustices to my beautiful fairytale princess.
> 
>  
> 
> The elvhen is a mishmash of words and bits.
> 
> _Hallaviran_ \- Sweet path, or pleasant path I guess
> 
>  _Hallam'sha_ \- helpful girl
> 
> I like to imagine that Solas and Vivienne get along in a weird way, since they're both very powerful mages, and the way they snipe at each other about their magic seems pretty passive aggressively helpful sometimes. If you've ever had friends that are both very talented at one thing, the party conversation between them will be very recognizable. 
> 
>  
> 
> And lastly, I'm once again trying to write everyday, so this is all only barely edited and unbeta'd. I give it a few read overs before I post it, and then leave it be. Although if I notice any mistakes in the next few days I might go back and change it! If you notice anything feel free to speak up. I'm helpless.


	6. Cole

#####

 

Solas is thankfully saved from either crippling by qunari boots; or worse, _manhandling_ by someone actually skilled in the art of dance and seduction, which might be even worse, when young Trevelyan comes to his solarium and asks if he’d like to join him in the Hinterlands.

“Me, Cole, the Iron Bull, and you, seem to be enough to take care of a dragon, wouldn’t you think?” He explains cheerfully, investigating Solas’ carefully stacked jars of paint and brushes with all the intuitiveness and grace of a horse with a bucket on it’s head.

“A dragon.”

“Yeah! It’s an enormous one. Almost as big as the one we saw on the Storm Coast.” Cooper sighs, a dreamy look on his face. “She’s been nesting in the valley, and it’s _completely_ overrun.” Solas knew that the human enjoyed tales of valor and feats of bravery; Orlesian chevaliers, and heroic wardens. He’d had Cassandra relate her famed dragon hunt in exhaustive detail as they rode to the latest mission or battlefield, repeatedly, until even the Iron Bull had grown slightly weary of it.

But this newest trial would be testing Solas’ patience. As well as his barriers.

“I would be… _Honored._ To join you Inquisitor. Although, perhaps Vivienne would be a better choice?” He tries, a last ditch effort to escape both certain muddy reptilian death, as well as helping Vivienne teach peasants how to dance.

“Sh’e busy arranging Haramshiral. Trust me, I tried. Her ice magic would have been invaluable, but as it is, your barriers will be a large help. Cassandra has been helping me hammer out a plan- It’s going to be me and Bull as distractions, with Cole serving as cover for you. I’ve arranged him to be carrying any lyric you may need, as well as enough dragonbane poison on his knives to kill a whole flock of dragons.” The Inquisitor seems to pause in his investigation of Solas’ personal items, and the elf takes advantage of this to remove the small, rather delicate jar from his large hands, and set it safely on his desk.

“What do you call multiple dragons? A flock? A fury?”

 

“High dragons do not flock, therefor it is a pointless gesture to name a multiple instance. But the word you are looking for is a _catastrophe._ ”

 

Cooper Trevelyan grins.

 

“Promising. We leave tomorrow at first light. Try to bring your best staff for rejuvenation.”

 

Solas sighs, as the Inquisitor leaves earshot with cheerful whistling, and an exclamation of delight as he sees someone who will no doubt hound the well meaning man for favors. “I will _try_ to sleep through the anticipation.”

 

#######

 

Solas had given thought to how he was going to approach Cole for his part in the bet, but hadn’t reached much conclusion.

 

He was a sweet, helpful creature, and Solas wasn’t so naive to think that just because the spirit was clueless to some of the nuances of material existence that he lacked the capacity to kiss a friend purely platonically. He’d seen the young man watching Bull in the tavern, visible and curious and strangely more focussed now that he had taken the Inquisitor’s advice and become more human. Despite his misgivings, Solas was forced to admit that he seemed calmer now, less detached to the happenings of mundane life. If slightly more tactless.

The lad would be watching as Bull bounced a tavern girl on his knee, hands under the table and Krem rolling his eyes as he tried to catch the attention of the lovesick serving girl. Or Solas would catch sight of him sitting crosslegged at Cassandra’s knee, picking at weeds and sparse grass in the training fields as Cassandra read out loud from a book, with a rapt look of attention from the Seeker and a fetching flush across her cheeks. Cole would look pleased at the attention, but confused at some of the story.

 

“If we’re letting him rip people from gut to gullet with kitchen knives,” Varric had pointed out conversationally, when Trevelyan had brought up his concerns to the two of them later, about matters of love that Cole might have to navigate. Probably instigated by the bet itself, which probably worried Trevelyan the most out of all of them. “Then we can trust the kid to not get his heart broken, hm?”

 

All of his worry was for naught however.

 

“Cole.” He asks a day into their journey, slightly hesitantly, holding the bundle he’d found in his tent.  
It was warmer down in the valley, not like the brittle icy spring that had taken Skyhold in a chilly grip that kept everyone bundled in cloaks and furs. He’d taken no notice of Cole’s absence as they set up camp, but it’s not surprising that he would have been out collecting flowers and leaves, small bits of Crystal Grace and Divine Breath, and delicate spindly sprigs of bloodwort that was one of Solas’ favorite scents.

It made a delightful bouquet, strangely elegant considering the normal bits of feathers and rock and knives Cole normal collected, all tied with a rather shabby ribbon.

Cole looked up from where he was watching Bull sharpen his axe, hands clasped on his knees and hat almost completely obscuring his shoulders and head. As he tilted his head back, Solas was reminded of a flower turning towards the sun, eyes wide and pale and transparent.

 

“Yes?”

 

“Why were these flowers in my bedroll?”

 

Bull barks out a short delighted laugh, startling Cole into turning and blinking curiously at him. He seems abashed at that, and turns it into a cough, looking down as Solas glares at him.

“Sorry, sorry, ignore me.”

“Gladly.” Solas replies drily.

“I thought you’d like them.” Cole looks worried, picking at the threads of his pants,   
before getting to his feet with a hand on either side of his hat to hold it down over his face. Solas refrains from stooping to make eye contact, but only barely.

“I’m sorry, I’ll get different ones. _The smell of elf root is a beacon for memories I’d rather forget, but sometimes at night a dry sprig is just what’s needed to bring recollection. Peace. A slumber that’s deep enough to hide the twinges of regret-_ ”

“Cole.” Solas cuts him off with a hand on his shoulder, and feels as the muscles under his hands tense as taut as a wire. “I like the flowers just fine. Thank you.”

Cole turns his face up and smiles brightly, if a little hesitantly, an unexpected expression that causes Solas smile slightly back, if only in surprise.

 

“I’m glad Solas.”

 

That is not the last of it.

 

He finds small cakes that are his favorite from the kitchens, thick with nuts and honey as well as flakes of oat softened in brandy. They’re slightly squashed, but Solas can only think of one person with pockets deep and mysterious enough to have spirited his favorite dessert all the way down mountain, and to camp down in the valley two days after they’re departure.

 

He finds one of his empty lyrium bottles resting in his saddle bag, filled with crystal clear liquid, small polished round stones and spindleweed. Spindleweed has been known to glow in small genetic percentages, and it seems someone has picked the brightest and the liveliest with unnerving precision, making a small light that resembles nothing more than a dream bubble made of the quietest bubbling brook.

It’s enchanting, and to Solas’ quiet pleasure it lasts long into the night, and even longer the following days, entirely happy to be contained in a small bottle.

 

He catches Cole again, and this time it’s by himself out of sight of Trevelyan and Iron Bull, who are no doubt sweating and being loud somewhere while they get themselves prepared for fighting a giant fire breathing monster as they camp their way down through the burgeoning spring forest.

They’re out of sight of the camp, and Solas is temporarily intrigued to find out what Cole does when he’s not haunting his own solarium, being a calming and interrogative presence, or shadowing one of the other inner circle until their patience runs out and he finds things to do amongst the small folk.

“Cole?”

 

Cole looks up, and to Solas’ complete unsurprise he’s holding some leftovers from lunch in one hand, bits of bread and root that Trevelyan had uncharacteristically left on the side of his plate earlier that day, and a small nug in the other. 

It’s a measure of Cole’s newly found human-ness that he looks slightly embarrassed that he hadn’t heard Solas’ approach. “He’s small, and the other’s don’t let him eat any of the shoots that grow from the top of the burrow.”

“That’s very kind of you.” Solas says carefully, stepping up and giving the small creature a scratch behind the ear. It lets out a nervous chirrup, eyes wide and dilated with alarm at this strange new presence, but unwilling to give up it’s free lunch. It’s mouth moves furiously as it chews, trembling faintly, and Cole strokes it on one leathery ear with a long, scarred finger to calm it. It seems to work, as it’s mouth stills, and it turns to whuffle at the fingers fondly.

 

“Cole,” Solas begins, carefully, as Cole’s shoulders tense and he strokes the nug with a slight increase in pressure. “I appreciate your gifts, they’re very nice.”

Cole nods briefly, wobbling his hat and still not looking up, just gently feeding another scrap to the nug, who makes a small trilling noise. He wipes his hand on his trousers after the creature snuffles wetly across it, and Solas makes a note to have a talk with Varric. If anyone could convince Cole to get in a bath, it would be the dwarf who had Cole wrapped around his finger with a combination of stories, and uncharacteristic paternal affection.

 

“… This isn’t being brought on by something is it?”

 

“Cassandra said it would be romantic.”

 

Out of all the things Solas expected, this was not it.

 

“Ah…” He clenches the bottle in his hand, and stares. It’s not like him, to be blindsided like this by a sudden emotion by his own companions and colleagues. He’s generally a much better judge of character. But. Romance?

 

Cole looks up and seems troubled, his arms tightening around the nug who’s completely complacent to be crushed to the lads chest with a faint, squeaky expulsion of air and another chomping motion that disappears the crumbs from Cole’s sleeve. “You want to kiss me.”

“Oh.”

Yes. The relief makes his lungs work again, and Solas sighs out a long breath. “Of course. That silly bet of Varric’s- You do realize that it doesn’t require actual romance? And that-“ He hesitates, pride pricking small holes in his ego, until he finally manages to get out, “You don’t _have_ to kiss me. I’m sure Varric would understand.”

“I’m not scared of kissing.” Cole says, the closest to irritated that Solas has ever heard him when talking to himself. If Solas didn’t know any better, he’d swear Cole just rolled his eyes at him. “I don’t feel that way for you Solas. Not like Blackwall thinks of Josephine. Or Dorian thinks about Cooper.” He considers his words carefully, slowly. It’s a noticeable difference to the breathless rush he normally allows himself. “I do love you I think. You care about me, and you help. You have secrets, and you think you can’t love- But but you care.”

 

“Then.” He doesn't want to out right come and tell Cole to kiss him _now_ , as there is clearly something troubling the boy. He cares for his well being, and the past few months have been particularly hard and confusing for him. “Can I ask what the presents are for, then, if you don’t think of me that way?”

 

Cole seems to remember that he’s uncomfortable, and Solas recognizes him being uncertain. “Cassandra says that your first kiss is special. I didn’t want to ruin it.”

“Cole.” He can’t help smiling. “You can’t ruin a first kiss. A first kiss is by definition only _first._ There will be many better ones, or perhaps many worse ones. But you can’t _ruin_ it.”

“Cassandra’s had too many teeth, and the boy told her later she looked like a dog  
someone had beat with a stick.”

“Well. That’s… Unfortunate.” Venehdis, no wonder she looked like she wanted to break someone’s arm all the time. “But still, it was a first kiss.” He racks his brain for a moment while Cole searches his pockets for any more snacks. They seem to be not forthcoming. “You can always have your first kiss with someone else, if you like. I would hate for you to not enjoy the experience, if it matters so much to you. I’m sure Bull is a simply crook of the finger away- Although, I would prefer you didn’t if I’m being entirely honest.” The idea of Bull kissing or otherwise wooing Cole brought a throb to his temple. “If you’d like to wait until we get back to Skyhold-“

 

Cole finally crouches down, letting the nug go. It doesn’t go far, simply waddling over to a small sprout of flowers under the moist dark of a log, and sticking it’s blunt, square head underneath. He straightens, and steps forward uncertainly, reaching out to take Solas’ empty hand, the one that had been cupping and tapping his elbow thoughtfully..

 

“It’s alright Solas. You’ve had many kisses. It’s good for you to part with one.”

“That’s right. I’d be happy, although you’d also be doing me a large favor.” Solas confirms.

“Varric doesn’t really want to win. He simply likes to make people smile. Vivienne smiled, after you left, touching her hands to her lips and remembering the Duke who brought her flowers when she still wore her hair long.”

“I suppose that’s good news. But don’t let her catch you spreading that around.”

 

Cole nodded solemnly, and Solas leaned in to kiss him without further reluctance.

He’s touched that Cole thinks so highly of him in this moment. He was thinking perhaps one of the serving girls he remembered from Skyhold would be a good substitution. She was sweet enough. Or the baker girl that occasionally left Cole pastries in his attic room, which he’d observe in puzzlement for a bit before leaving in the windowsill for the birds. A few time’s Solas is sure he’d seen Cole watching that friend of Bull’s, the Tevinter, who was second in command. Bull is a fine judge of character, and Solas believes anyone who kept company in the Chargers would be nothing but gentlemanly. 

 

But this is fine as well.

 

Solas thinks about how he should keep a more careful eye on Cole, if he was this cool in his leathers after walking and fighting all day. Perhaps he didn’t know what being too cold _was_ , or too hot. These things were simply memories of a boy who had been entirely too used to both, and something Cole had never truly experienced for himself. He didn’t know to wear a coat, or drink water to cool off.

His hand creeps up and curls around Cole’s ribs as the spirit kisses back uncertainly, thin lips opening, and his tongue coming out in a gesture that Solas should have expected, in someone who had seen countless memories and emotions of kissing without ever being able to experience first hand. He allows it, with the words about first kisses that was rather childish of the Seeker echoing in his head.

A small flicker of soft emotion that Solas doesn’t want to disregard entirely flares up, and he tucks the bottle in his pocket to free his other hand. Thus freed, he places it gently around Cole’s jaw, fingers touching every point of pulse in the soft skin of his throat and chin.

Cole pulls back and frowns, reaching up and touching the hand uncertainly.

“It’s what people do, when they kiss.” Solas clarifies, determined to make sure Cole took something from this experience to make it memorable. Solas doesn’t respect the decision to give up the Fade, or spirithood, and all the trappings of an ethereal life without the banality of material existence that dragged at himself so heavily.

But he likes Cole. If this is an experience he wants to have, with flowers and gifts and one hand wrapped around Solas’ wrist like a swooning maidens, then Solas would be more than happy to humor him. If for no other reason but it would be better him than _Bull._ Or some soldier too quick to take advantage of someone’s willingness to follow them behind a barn.

 

Cole leans again, happily eager and with a determined furrow between his eyebrows. This time is better, and Solas carefully draws Cole’s mouth back, leading with coaxing tongue and teeth until Cole’s hands were somewhere by his collar bone, and he made a small noise of pleased surprise at the sensations it drew out of him.

 

“Solas. You _dog._ ”

 

Solas wasn’t alarmed in the least at the interruption, having been expecting it somewhere in the pessimistic part of his brain. Neither was Cole, who retreats back with a faint smack of moist air, and a look of someone who has been presented with a very abstract problem that are being forced to solve; Eyes focussed somewhere about Solas’ chin, and brow furrowed.

Solas sighs heavily. “Yes, Bull. Can I help you?”

“Not as of this moment.” The qunari was leaning against a tree, the skin of the eye under his eyepatch tugging the side of his face up as he grinned. Solas isn’t surprised that he didn’t hear footsteps. The Iron Bull was terrifyingly quiet for such a large man. “Just enjoying the view. Kid, you’re doing that wrong; You need to stick your hand under his shirt.”

Solas immediately stops Cole’s obedient motion towards his tunic, and gives Bull a glare. 

“Alright. I believe that fills the parameters of both first kisses, and Varric’s bet quite thoroughly- Why don’t you go talk to Trevelyan, Cole?”

“Yeah, I’m sure he’ll love to hear all about this.” Bull says with a dark chuckle, as Cole stops for a moment to pet the nug after Solas releases him. Bull claps the rogue heavily on the shoulder as he leaves, almost knocking him down, before fixing his gaze on Solas.

 

“That was awful nice of you.”

“I enjoy Cole’s company. He’s a friend.” Solas said firmly, without any hint of guilt.

“Yeah. Sweet kid. Tell me, would you have done it if he’d decided to stay a spirit?”

“He would not have wanted it, if he’d remained a spirit.” Solas frowns, his path back to camp blocked by Bull with his questions and his smug gaze.

“True.” He groans, stretching large grey arms in the manner of someone who had been walking all day and was stiff. He settles back against the tree without any hurry, and Solas crosses his arms impatiently. “Well, I’m going to be honest, I didn’t expect you’d get this far. Varric firmly believes you have unplumbed depths, but I was under the opinion that you’d never get that stick up your ass loose enough to finish the rounds. And I’m the first one to say,” Bull examines his nails casually. “I’m not usually wrong.”

“There is much you don’t know about me, the Iron Bull.”

“I’m beginning to realize that.”

 

Solas sidesteps him in the close path between the oak trees, towards camp, and Bull finally allows it with in obsequious gesture that cause Solas’ to frown in irritation. “We should return to camp. After all, we’re going to be fighting a dragon on the morrow.” And he’s starting to grow tired of this line of questioning, although he feels that Bull is simply puzzled, rather than accusing.

 

“Well, _shit_.” The warm rumble of laughter follows Solas up the path as Bull trails after him, with heavy and pointed footsteps. “If we’re going to be fighting a _dragon_ tomorrow, the last thing I’m going to be doing is _sleeping._ ”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ~~~~~~~~~~~
> 
>  
> 
> This chapter fought me a lot, both because Cole is one of my favorite characters and I didn't want to fuck it up, and also because I didn't have time to dither over it like I wanted. Nanowrimo waits for no man.
> 
> I hope I addressed my reasons for being ok with colemance, while also addressing the importance of treating him like the flower he is.


	7. Leliana

#####

 

They limp their way back to Skyhold victorious, if very battered.

 

Trevelyan has lost his armor, so dented and battered and scorched that he’d had to enlist Bull’s help in prying it off after the dragon finally laid slain. Underneath he was rather raw, and the patches of burn had required immediate attention. Solas had done what he could, but it would still scar impressively. Of course, they now had enough dragon bone and hide to make the loss negligible, and Cooper had been sighing dreamily the whole way back, even as sore and irritable as the party was.

Cole had inconsolably lost a knife, after being knocked into an outcropping of rock and dropping it down a crevasse. Even after Trevelyan had promised to make him a new one with dragon bone, he’d stared down into the dark hole forlornly, and looked at his remaining knife with an air of confusion. Solas had healed his broken hand, and given him a fond pat on the shoulder.

Bull was a wreck.

“I’ll take Bull to the infirmary.” Trevelyan says as they get off of their horses, soldiers coming forward to take their supplies, and stablehands taking the mounts. The Inquisitor slides off of his mount and impressively catches Bull as the qunari almost _collapses_ the minute his feet touch the ground. His leg is broken, unfortunately, and Solas hadn’t had enough mana to heal it. Not that he hadn’t tried, but the man had waved him off, citing Cole’s hand and Trevelyan’s third degree burns as far more important. Not to mention, he’d scoffed, qunari are much hardier than these soft humans.

“Take these reports to Leliana? She needs my markers for the trail up. It’s ridiculous that we still have to deal wth bandits, but there you have it- Cmon Bull.” The human’s muscles flex impressively as he heaves one of Bull’s arms across his shoulders, and Solas for once is graceful that the Inquisitor is such an oversized warrior. Bull would have crushed any one of the apprehensive looking stable boys.

“They should be able to fix him without any trouble. Don’t worry.” Solas watches as Trevelyans mouth pinches together tightly, giving him a nod, before the two of them set off towards the healer tent, Bull swearing the whole way.

“ _At least it’s my bad leg- Worse comes to worse they can chop it off and I can get a kick ass prosthetic.”_ Cole says, with a wrinkle of his nose, and Solas rolls his eyes.

“Ever the dramatic, our Bull. He will be fine. We have potions in the Inquisition that can mend bone easily, and qunari are particularly adept at knitting bone. Fortunately for him.”

Cole looks alarmed.

“Knitting is what you call it when bones heal.” Solas clarifies, and Cole nods with a look of relief.

“Oh. That’s better.” He leaves Solas standing on the straw strewn cobbles, after giving his horse a last fond pat on the nose and accepting a rather slimy kiss across his neck and face that musses his hair and hat. Then he heads off towards the tavern, spinning his remaining knife on his palm like a restive compass. Solas makes another note to talk to Varric about that bath, when he catches a glimpse of the hair stuck up along the back of Cole’s head, under his hat.

 

Then he heads to the spymaster’s tower.

 

He passes his solarium, and the urge to simply pause briefly and check his things, perhaps write his thoughts, is almost overwhelming. But it would be better to get this task over with now rather than later, so that Leliana can take the measures she needs to with her people, as well as Cullen and his army, before the sun goes down.

They’re quite talented, the two of them, working in tandem like two hands of a machine. it makes him realize that perhaps the right and left hand metaphor of the divine isn’t such a ridiculous idea, if three advisors for the Inquisitor can get so much done while their illustrious leader is out fighting. It seems every time they returns from the field there’s countless tasks to do, causing Cooper Trevelyan to drag his feet back into the main building from the stables, reluctance written cross his features.

 

The stairs are long, but he’s barely out of breath as he gives Dorian a friendly nod. He’s currently cornering the librarian, who has a desperate look about her eyes, and holding a book as if it’s a piece of trash. Solas catches a glimpse of the title, and winces. Yes, he supposes he could understand Dorian’s ire.  
He barely glances at Solas, beyond an arch of his eyebrow at Solas’ singed sleeve, and a spot of blood smeared down one side of his robe where him and Trevelyan had gotten Bull on his horse. He shrugs in return.

 

Solas leaves him to his interrogation, weaving through the dusty shelves and past the tranquil with her desk of papers and bits of leather and feathers, and up one more flight. His head comes up first, and his curious glance around the circular atrium takes in the birds eyeing him from their perches, feathers as inky black as the hood and cloak of their spymaster. The sound of their preening is as soft and ever present as rain, and it’s as soothing up here as it is for him down in his own room.

 

Leliana is at her desk, her hand somewhere in the depths of her cloak, no doubt rubbing at her mouth in a nervous tic. It’s not something she does often- This is perhaps the second time Solas has seen it, the first being on the way up to the Conclave to help Trevelyan close the rift the first time. The caw of one of the birds causes her to look up, and Solas notes how quickly the hand returns to the desk, braced next to it’s partner.

 

There’s a brief flash of a moment, so quick he’s almost sure he imagined it; Her eyes come up and meet his face, registering who it is, and _then_ , her hand that had started on the desk moves in the most minute of twitches towards her belt. Where she keeps a knife.

 

 _Interesting._ He doesn’t flinch, and pretends he saw nothing when her face spreads into a welcoming smile.

 

“Ah. Solas. I didn’t hear you come up.”

 

“Yes. I’m told I’m rather quiet.” Solas informs her with an apologetic tilt of his head, reviewing what he knows and coming to the conclusion that perhaps sneaking up on the Spymaster is one of the things he should avoid doing in the future.

Not if the immediate response is an excellently hidden reflex of mistrust, and a small shift in front of whatever she’s doing at her work station.

“Apologies for startling you. I’ve brought you our young friends latest report. What bandits might be left after we made our way through the pass, I shudder to think of.”

She comes forwards and plucks it carefully out of his hand, running her eyes over it, and giving him a friendly smile. “Yes, thank you.”

 

And then she turns away, dismissing him.

 

He turns to leave, and pauses, one foot on the stairs.

 

“Yes?” Leliana asks, after he stands their for a few heart beats, frowning. “Is there anything else?”

“Perhaps.”

_Why are you so mistrustful? What have I given away?_ He doesn’t say. Solas turns to leans against the doorway, ears carefully pricked to hear anyone coming up the steps as Leliana turns once more towards him, this time slightly more visibly attentive. “I trust you know about my bet I have with Varric?”

“Ah yes. That silly thing- I think it’s quite charming, and a good idea. It’s good for comrades to release some steam.”

“So. I have to kiss you. I trust this won’t be a problem?” He feigns casualty, but even watching closely, he doesn’t get the slightest whiff of discomfort as Leliana laughs.

“Of course, it should be nor problem!” She waves a hand airily. “I’ve kissed many a boy and girl, Solas. One rather crabby elf won’t make any difference.” She taps a finger thoughtfully onto her chin. “And my Warden of course will not mind- He and I have an arrangement with room for silly escapades such as this.”

“I’m sure.” Solas smiles and steps up to her, even as his heart races.

 

He knows as much about the Spymaster perhaps as anybody does- She used to be a bard. Sometimes, you can still hear her singing silly little songs to her birds up in her aeries, or humming tunes as she walks down the halls.

She fought with the hero of Ferelden, in the last battle of Denerim. Admirable, and a feather in the cap of any warrior. Someone who faces down an archdemon with nothing but a stick, string, and a pointier stick was someonee with bravery and cunning. The fact that she had a mage trained in the elvhen art of the Arcane Warriors of old, as well as a Templar and a spirit mage, did little to detract from the legendary feat.

He also knows, out of all the observant people in the inquisition- Bull, Varric, Sera with her dumb animal distrust that’s slightly more perceptive than he’d anticipated, and sweet Cole who he’s sure already has his suspicions, even if he doesn’t fully understand the implications-  
Leliana is the one he’s most concerned and wary of.

 

For some reason, despite the smile without a single hint of animosity, and the way she hooks a hand in his sleeve to draw him close with a self deprecating chuckle, Solas very much feels as if his life is in danger.

It draws a prickle across his scalp and shoulders, and he realizes he’s facing someone who is perhaps just as skilled with the long game as he is. And just as effective at hiding their intentions. Far from scaring him, it sends a small thrill tingling up his spine, that he hides with his own embarrassed shrug and sideways glance, as if checking to make sure no one has snuck up on them in this suggestive stance, even though the two of them know he would hear anybody long before they even stepped onto the bottom step of her staircase.

 

Leliana leans back against her desk, drawing her with him, and to an outsider it would look as if they were two friends sharing a silly, intimate moment. Leliana smiling and her eyes hidden coquettishly by her hood, and Solas’ faint smirk and half lidded eyes.

 

But there’s nothing but cold contempt and a searching enquiry as sharp as any blade in her gaze.

 

“I must ask you Solas. I’ve been looking into you.” She’s quiet, almost whispering. Intimate.

Her hand comes up and plays with a loose thread on his shoulder, and this close Solas is drawn into her grey eyes, the scent of herbs and parchment, and the dusty and slightly sharp and dirty smell of feathers. She lets the crows sit on her as she works, feeding them bits of meat and corn. There’s faint wrinkles in the corner of her eyes,as well as a crooked tilt to the beautiful slope of her nose, and the teeth in her smile. “We were so grateful, when help arrived. So _blessed_ you showed up when you did. Seeker Cassandra thinks very highly of you, although I’m sure she doesn’t say so.”

“I have nothing but for respect for the lady Seeker.”

Leliana makes a noncommittal noise. Solas only has a view of one hand, the one currently tracing an idle path down his front as she leans the slightest bit closer. It’s a noise that says she doesn’t quit believe him.

“Not a single trace of you any where Solas- You were nowhere you could have gotten news of the Conclave if _I_ haven’t heard of you. Not the faintest trace of an elven apostate with a talent for rift magic. And even among spiritual circles. Nobody knows of your expertise. Nobody knows,” Solas is suddenly and chillingly certain that the hand he can’t see is touching the hilt of a knife. “About _you._ Nothing in templar reports. Nothing in any alienages. If you were so far removed from the public eye as to be invisible, with your staff, and your lack of vallaslin, how did you darken our doorway so quickly? With _just_ ,”

A crow caws, and neither one of them flinch in the slightest. They’re close enough where Solas can smell the honey on her breath.

“What we need, to save the day?”

 

He has always admired the Orlesians for their untapped potential for violence. When they weren’t preening their feathers prettily, or playing silly courtroom games.

 

Solas stays silent, not a single trace of fear on his face. Simply a pleasant and blank puzzlement. Because even the Spymaster, as magic-less as she is, could feel the sudden vibration in the air, the wavering tension of magic just beyond the reality they know. Rift magic is sudden, and messy. And he’d hate to do it indoors like this, where it might stain.

 

“I assure you, my dear Leliana, I wish nothing but to help the Inquisition defeat Corypheus.” He makes it sound as if he’s hurt by the implications. An annoyed and exasperated tone. But he doesn’t think so lowly of her talents that he would match the expression to the words. Simply keeps the same blank and pleasant puzzlement. The same half lidded and predatory interest.

 

“Hm. Yes. _That_ I believe. But that simply puts you at an angle with us- Don’t you think that I believe for a _second_ ,” And she smiles for real this time, through the clunky vowels of her accent. Solas hadn’t realized what her real smiles looked like, until he sees the violence in it, here and now. “I think this puts us on the same _side_.”

 

Solas pauses just a moment too long in reply, purposefully. Drawing it long enough where Leliana’s eyes round out the slightest bit in surprise, and perhaps a bit of helpless anger. A proud anger that she has no more proof than this; A sneaking suspicion, and an elongated and patronizing silence in the middle of a sentence that places her suspicions firmly into the realm of _certainty._

He missed this.

 

“I’m hurt that after all I’ve done for the Inquisition, I am cast into suspicion like this.”

“I’m sure.” Leliana says, and for a moment they’re at an impasse. Solas feels a pressure on his tunic and a faint tickle. He’s almost certain that rather than a knee, or a fingertip one would expect in the brushing front to front of their bodies, it’s the tip of a blade. The tension in the air ratchets higher, and if Leliana had missed the tingle of magic, there was no possibility that she would miss the way her back molars must ache as Solas reigns his spell in tighter, control hanging by a thread.

And then she throws her head back in a bright an cheerful laugh, girlish.

“Messere Solas, this is so _sudden!_ Dorian better keep an eye out, if he thinks he will be exempt from this little escapade of yours.” She says conspiratorially enough, loudly so that it draws an indignant and muffled bit of swearing from down below. The stage is set, the act complete, and now is only left for the finale.

 

She leans forward and bites him on the mouth, slowly and sharply, with blunt human teeth used to biting off consonants as often enough as verses of song, and Solas tastes nothing but blood and honey. As his eyes close the rest of the way in a wince, and then open with a determined set to his mouth and the lay of his pointed ears, he can see a mug of tea on the desk which she’s reclining on. Rough ceramic, staining the wood in a ring and still faintly steaming.

It smells like elfroot.

He kisses her back, and even in all of his years of wandering, it’s perhaps the most violent and bloody kiss he’s ever shared, as his hand tightens just the slightest bit on her wrist, probably bruising, and the prick on his stomach grows to a full bloom of pain.

 

Leliana breaks it first, as her smirk grows too wide to contain both of their mouths and tongues, and she draws back, lips stained a bright cherry red and not the slightest flush to her cheeks. Not a single twinkle in her eyes, which are flat and as cold as twin mirrors. If her pupils are dilated, Solas fancies it’s the same reason a cats would be, when presented with a bird slightly too big and dangerous for it. A falcon, perhaps.

 

“Good luck on the rest of your list.” She says, and Solas knows she means something else entirely as she releases him.

 

When he looks at her and down, there’s no trace of a blade, beyond a small pencil dot of blood on his tunic.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one had the littlest read through of all of them, only one pass over for editing, because I'm working almost fifty hours in the next seven days, and generally don't get home until midnight. But I'm still going to keep going! I'm determined to write something every day this month, and so far it's looking promising.
> 
>  
> 
> I'm not sure if canonically Leliana and Solas have this confrontation, because I didn't romance Solas and probably missed out on a whole lot of cutscenes. But I hope so. (And I hope it went like this cough cough)
> 
> I love everyones comments and immensely enjoy everyone's weird taste in rare pairs. God bless everyone of you and god bless this deserted train we're on. Keep telling me who you're most excited for/didn't know you needed because it feeds me


	8. Dorian

########

 

It was almost a week after the dragon before Solas sensed an opportunity for his next kiss.

 

Truly, it was starting to become slightly tiresome. Sera using any acrobatic means to leave the room via the closest window any time she saw him coming was a refreshing change of pace, of course. He hadn’t had to hear her grating laugh since this whole thing began.

On the other hand, he’d caught a few serving girls staring at him and blushing. No doubt after Varric had regaled the tale of him seducing both Iron Bull and Blackwall in a _stable_ , like some sort of tawdry Orlesian novel. He’d been telling the whole tavern, and embellishing the details to ludicrous proportions. It did not help that Iron Bull would roar with laughter and wink outrageously whenever it was brought up, while Blackwall would simply blush right red and attempt to be dignified.

 

Still, the vaguely gobsmacked look Varric had given him, when he conversationally said that Leliana had allowed him his prize, _was_ incredibly satisfying. so the bet wasn't a complete waste of time, after all.

 

The small lift in his mood that results from his little victories, makes it easy for him to climb the steps to the tower once again, seeking out Dorian for his opinion on a piece of magical necromancy they’d found in a venatori research outpost. What they had been doing there, in the dark depths of an abandoned castle with nothing but rash vine and deep mushrooms to witness their works, was anyone’s guess.

It grates to have to seek the humans help, but even he has to admit, Dorian has a certain flair for necromancy that would make a nevarran corpse priest jealous.

 

“Dorian?” He knocks lightly against the bookshelf leading into Dorian’s alcove, wary of startling him. It didn’t take any amount of observation to know that the man was nervous as a canary in the deep roads, even in the relative safety of Skyhold. Not everyone appreciated having a tevinter ‘magister’ in the Inquisitor's inner circle; And still fewer appreciated the same man bringing the dead to life on the battlefield to do his bidding, like some mummer show villain.

 

The small alcove is tucked between two large, impressively loaded shelves, and Solas suspects that all of the best and brightest of the books in the Inquisitions hold are located within arm reach of Dorian’s armchair. A plush, bright red, velvet thing that Bull had pulled out of an abandoned Orlesian mansion in the Emerald Graves with much kowtowing and sarcastic flourishes that had thrown Dorian into a strop fit to rival a dragons.

But if anyone was ever looking for him, they’d find him with his boots toed off looking caught out, curled in the chair with a bottle of something tucked in his arm and a book resting on the arm.

The shelves also trapped the weak spring sunshine coming in from the window, causing the sun warmed books to give off a dusty scent, and heating the alcove a degree or two above the rest of the library. it was quite pleasant, Solas had to admit.  
Apparently though, it was _too_ pleasant. Because Dorian was in a light doze when he finally found him, head tipped down so his chin rested against his collar, hair dangling rakishly in front of his eyes where it wasn’t shorn short above the ears.

A book dangled from his fingers, resting against his knee, and when Solas came closer to inspect, he found a few fingers of brandy in a glass, with a small bottle. Not enough to get drunk, but perhaps enough to cause sleep in the warmth of a sunbeam.

 

Sometimes the similarities between Dorian and a common house cat astounded him. It might as well have been warm milk.

 

“Dorian?” He tries first, not very loudly. There’s not a stir. The man snoozes on, although there’s a faint wrinkle of his nose, and a small soft smack of his mouth. He turns his face, book dropping the rest of the way to the floor with a _thump_ , and burying his cheek and nose against the wing of the chair. He’s going to wake up with marks on his face and mustache half stuck up.

 

_’Cat. A gray tabby cat.’_ Solas thinks despairingly.

 

He sighs, and pulls one of the scraps of fabric Dorian had pinned up in the alcove over the entrance, completing the complete enclosure of the space and causing the light to turn the same pinkish shade as the curtain. He found a spot close to Dorian’s feet on the floor, covered in a shaggy ornamental rug textured with loose, pulled thread and runs. It was soft though, and warm over the cold stone flags. It’s not any trouble to pry a pillow out from Dorian’s armchair collection, and put it behind the small of his back to prevent twinges of pain later.

 

And then, with the fast ease of long practice, he fell asleep.

 

#####

 

The Fade was a part he’s never visited before.

 

It was gray, with towering gray buildings that flickered into overreaching, sprawling trees when his eyes moved away from them. He could see nothing but black in between the trunks and storefront windows, like a page out of a fairytale storybook. Inky and solid, without the slightest hint of wisping at the edge of the shadows. It was almost childlike, in it's simplicity. As if someone had cut out shapes in black and grey, and left them propped up.

Things moved, but he knew they were nothing more than imaginings of whoever’s dream her was currently in, rather than actual fade creatures. No spirits or demons yet- Simply raw idea.

 

Ahead, Solas could hear music, faint. He almost took it for the rushing of wind in leaves far, far above, as high as the cliffs were in the Hissing Wastes. But as he grew closer, it began to sound like what it actually was; An Orlesian waltz.

The grass slowly begins to grow tile, and Solas comes out from between two trees; the last vestiges of tree root knuckling the ground under his feet, before his toes met smooth polished marble. A woman spins by him as if on clockwork, a lover encasing her in his arms. Another goes by, and another. All wearing gauzy empire dresses with tapered waists, and long trains, or crisply cut military style dress uniforms.

At the center of it, surrounded by wings of people all talking and laughing, is Dorian. He’s standing alone, tall, making small talk with a broad shouldered looking soldier with one hand on his own hip, and the other thrown out in a careless gesture. He practically sparkles under the light; But outside his circle of warmth, the people’s shadows flicker into that of larger, sharp toothed beasts. Hunkered and shaggy. When Solas looks closer, the trailing of the dresses skirts turn into serpentine tails, the sashes at the mens waist seeming a damper, brighter red than before.

A few this time, Solas senses with a predator’s eye, were actually demons. One winks coquettishly at him, and twirls away with a partner. The music is disjointed, halted. Broken sounding. As if whoever was attempting to play a lively waltz have had their fingers splintered beyond all repair.

 

“Dorian.” He says, approaching. He nods politely to the soldier, who suddenly seems irritated that he’s here. His hand is on the mages shoulder, companionably. But it wrinkles the cut of the cloth with how hard he's pressing, even if Dorian fails to show the slightest sign of discomfort.

 

If he seems surprised to see him here, he doesn't show it. Simply smiles, and accepts a glass of wine from someone in uniform who seems insistent on pressing it upon him. “Ah! Solas. It _is_ Solas, is it not?” Dorian plays at squinting at him, plucking at the sleeve of his robe, and Solas thinks wearily that if he _is_ a demon, Dorian would be playing a very dangerous game indeed.

 

“Ignore him my dear; Just a knife-ear.” Says the man with a derisive laugh, and Solas simply blinks blandly at him.   
_'Demon, most definitely.'_

“Come, dance with _me._ ”

“As I’ve told you before, I’m simply not a dancer.” Dorian laughs, as if repeating an often told joke. Solas approves. He plays the demons own game, right to the very end.

 

“Ah but you would dance with _me_. I know you _want_ it, you’re an anomaly. A _freak._ ” The thing purred, leaning in, and placing one hand on Dorian’s waist, proprietary. 

He doesn’t seem too concerned, and Solas remembers that Dorian in particular has mentioned having a daily tug of wills with Desire demons. Perhaps he is used to it. He acts as if he’s being bothered by someone particularly embarrassing at an actual party, rather than surround by demons all waiting for the slightest hint of emotion or weakness to take advantage of.

“After all, how much different would it be, having me riding behind your eyes? You’re already an _abomination,_ your own father said so. At least this way, you won’t be _alone._ ”

“Being alone is starting to sound very appealing.” Dorian replies drily, wincing slightly at the pinch of fingers that can’t seem to decide whether they want to be claws or not.

 

If Solas knows demons at all, this dream is due for a nightmarish turn.

 

“You _know_ you want to. Let me take you to a dark corner. Somewhere we won’t be _bothered_ , where I can have you _all,_ ” The demon leans in, scenting at Dorian’s ear while he grimaces. “To.”

The music jangles to a stop, one badly strung violin the last screech to be silenced. All the partners come to a gliding halt, faces blank but for strangely stretched and slavering jaws all turned towards Dorian and his faux-paramour. Perhaps based on an actual person, and that thought causes a small surge of disgust and anger in Solas that he doesn't allow to color his expression.

“ _Myself._ ”

Dorian opens his mouth, one hand coming up to push ineffectually at the chest blocking him in and looking intensely aggrieved. This was most likely a reoccurring theme in his nightmares; The beautiful party and beautiful people, and the nightmarish turn as suddenly he realizes he doesn’t _belong_. Dorian’s simply an outsider. An anomaly. A black sheep to be singled out by the jackals.

It probably had some effect in the past, and demons are never one to let a good thing be.

 

But Solas is growing weary of this, and as the demon glances smugly over Dorian’s shoulder at him, he lets just the briefest of his pretense slip.

 

It lasts barely a blink of a second-

 

The ground falls away and he _towers_ , everything sharpening with the clarity that four times as many sets of eyes can bring. Claws grate against the tile of the dance floor, and in the half second, every single dancer on the dance floor disappears as if they’d never been there in the first place. Just as suddenly and quickly Solas peeled the sheet of humanity back; showing teeth that could never be contained in the mouth he has, and at the same time the normal sized, elvhen priest with long dreads and furs and power wreathing both his hands; the demons caught a glimpse, and made the wise decision not to have anything more to do with him.

 

Demon’s are at heart, basic predators. And even a jackal knows to flee when there’s a wolf hovering over their kill.

 

The most powerful demon lets go and staggers back, and _keeps_ staggering back with a baleful glare as it retreats. Dorian turns, casting a now pleasantly puzzled looking Solas a curious glance as he’s released for the first time that night. Solas can see now that there’s a black imprint of hands, all over his arms. Dark, ugly bruises and creases that show over the clothes in that odd, dreamlike way that the Fade has, where he’d been pinned at the center of the party.

 

“Well. I don’t know what you did, but whatever it is looks like it should keep them away for quite a while.” There’s a sound of angry mutterings in the Fade around them, as the demons recede like shadows. The music begins again, hesitantly, and it sounds mush less discordant.

In fact, Solas thinks it might just be something he heard once. Very long ago.

 

“Perhaps. One can only hope.” He very carefully doesn’t ask any questions. Not about the man, who in reality he suspects is already long dead and burned, if he knows Dorian at all. And not about the bruises, or the bloodstain he can see on the dance floor behind him.

 

Dorian sips the wine in his hand, looking around and marveling. “So _quiet._ I never knew it could be this quiet- Here, you _are_ Solas, aren’t you?” Dorian casts him a suddenly suspicious look. “That would be just my luck, and just the way they’d get me isn’t it? ‘Oh, goody, the demons are all gone, let me just go wherever it is my good friend Solas wishes to take me.’”

Smart man. “It is me. I saw you sleeping in the library, and thought I might join you briefly. I apologize if I… _Intruded_ , on anything you’d rather I wouldn’t have seen.”

“Not at all. I’m sure none of this is a _surprise_ to you, after all.” Dorian says bitterly, taking another angry sip of his imaginary wine. “But. I would love to know what was so important that you’d embarrass yourself by falling asleep in the library with _me_. How uncouth for you.”

 

And here, Solas pauses uncertainly for the first time.

 

“Oh. Oh my goodness, this is it isn’t it.” Dorian feigns swooning, fanning at his face with one hand while Solas scowls at him. “Finally. The handsome elvhen lover of such renown, here to sweep me off my feet.”

“You’re being ridiculous.”

“But it’s true, is it not? Does it even count, if you kiss me in the Fade?”

“It is if you let it.” Solas sighs. “I’ve known of people who had entire relationships without touching once in the physical world.”

“Oooh. Titilating.”

_”Dorian.”_

“I only jest.” Dorian drains his glass, and carelessly tosses it over his shoulder, somewhere on the now endless dance floor. There was no sound of breaking glass. “Come now. One dance, then.”

He glared at him.

“What? Madame de Feur get’s a fairytale waltz, and I get an invasion of privacy and a crick in my neck from that blasted chair? It’s because I’m a man is it.” Dorian indignantly gathers himself up, as proud as the peacock his family is named for. “I’m just a piece of _meat_ to you? Where’s the _romance?_ ”

“You love that chair.” Solas points out, even as he sighs in defeat, and steps up to him.

“Yes. Possibly more than I’ve ever loved anything.” He replies flippantly, stepping into Solas arms and to Solas’ surprise, taking a lead position; But the Fade pulses briefly at the words, causing both of them to flinch.

Solas hears a laugh in the distance.

 

And then the music starts up.

 

They stay silent, as Dorian carefully leads him in the beginnings of a Tevinter type of dance he’d never bothered to learn the name of. It’s rather more formal than the Orlesian, which pretends at passion in it’s partners. but there’s something very geometric about it, the steps all carefully counted, and every interesting turn without a fumble Dorian’s part. He even twirls him, and when Solas comes back around glaring, Dorian’s smiling a smug cat grin.

Another set of steps, just as square as the first, but designed to carry it's dancer in a windmill pattern about the dance floor, so every couple has a chance to be in the center, as well as bow out once they reach the edge without disrupting anybody else. Although, it's notably different from both Orlesian and Ferelden dances, in which there's not so many breaks to switch partners. Nor, nearly so much high stepping, as charming as ferelden peasantry made it.

It’s rather too early in the dance, but apparently that doesn’t matter, because Dorian steps slightly back as the violin warbles it's solo refrain, and kisses Solas hand as dashing as any courtier. Solas rolls his eyes heavily. But they _are_ in the Fade, and far be it from him to discourage someone from being willful in the comfort of their own dream.

And the Dorian stands up and draws close, and kisses him.

It’s not nearly as whiskery as Bull or Blackwall, thankfully. To his chagrin, it’s actually the second best kiss yet.

It’s only under pain of death, or tranquility, that Solas will ever admit that Bull is one of the best kissers he’s ever met. Mostly, because he suspects the insufferable qunari already _knows._

Dorian’s tongue makes absolutely hesitation in it’s journey into Solas’ own mouth, and rather than being pushy he finds it slightly charming, and the slightest bit dizzying with the human’s larger hand spanning his waist, and the other coming up to cup his jaw. He digs his own fingers into Dorian’s arm, the other gathered into the lapels of Dorian’s jacket, and he can feel him smirking.

Solas bites his lip slightly, irritated, before Dorian apologetically softens his mouth, mustache tickling slightly against his nose and cheek and not leaving a single whisker of air between their lips. It should have been wet, but it was simply moist, warm, with just the right amount of pressure.

 

After a few moments, Solas finally pushes him away. He’s still glaring. He might have been glaring the whole time, if the way Dorian’s eyes are twinkling are anything to go by.

 

“You’re competing with Bull, aren't you.”

 

“He’s just been _such_ a braggart." Dorian complains. "You know how he is.”

 

Solas jerks them both rudely from the dream, and when he opens his eyes to the softly lit pink of Dorian’s library alcove, it’s to the sound of Dorian laughing over his head, and to the rustle and caw of a crow that has landed on the windowsill.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> #####
> 
>  
> 
> I've never written a kissing or romance scene before. So what do I do? Write like, fifty in a row. Sigh.
> 
> Work's crazy, but I'm still getting bits and pieces of other stuff out in place of this, mainly because I got a little stuck! I'm not sure if anyone realizes this, but coming up with plausible and interesting ways for Solas to kiss, say, Blackwall, or Vivienne, is REALLY REALLY HARD. OTL
> 
> I knew I was going to have SOMEONE get kissed in the Fade- And Vivienne would NEVER she's too responsible. Dorian it is then! Hope it doesn't come across as too heavy handed- But in my experience in gameplay, the Fade is heavy handed as a point of fact. It's like having an english lit major inventing dreams for people based on surface appearances.


	9. Cassandra

#####

 

“You’re flagging, Chuckles.”

 

Solas stiffens at his table, where he’s been poring over manuscripts on behalf of the Inquisitor. 

It’s mostly ancient elvish, blackened with age and partially ripped where their Inquisitor no doubt simply shoved it into his saddlebags without a single thought. He knows Varric was with the party; He’s more surprised the dwarf didn’t say anything, as respectful of the written word as he was. As it is now, he had to do some restorations using spirit magic before he even began his work that left him a little drained, and more than a little irritated.  
He’s not feeling up to the amount of verbal acrobatics it requires to keep up with the dwarf, and it perhaps makes him a little short.

“I beg pardon?”

“It’s been almost a month and a half. And you still have four left to go.” Varric holds up three thick, ink stained fingers from where he’s leaning against the door jam of Solas’ solarium. How he found time to write on the road, Solas has no idea. It’s night, or almost, with nothing but soft voices of researchers working late echoing through the tower.

“Cullen, Cooper, Cassandra,” He folds them down as he counts. “And Sera. I don’t know how you’re going to swing _those_ , but since I also didn’t know how you were going to swing _Vivienne_ , we’ll just see.” Varric looks impressed, and Solas doesn’t know what he wanted from this, if he had no expectations for Solas to succeed. For him to learn humility, perhaps? 

“I’m touched by your expectations.” Solas says drily, taking the scrolls he’s staring at in one careful, delicate touch. He flips it, and frowns at the back, murmuring a quick spell to see if there’s perhaps some sort of cipher or clue on the back. That was often the case with scrolls such as these, which as far as Solas can tell is simply a shipping manifest for an expedition, some time close to the fall of Arlathan. He’s reluctant to tell that to Cooper however- The poor lad would be crestfallen.

“Don’t be. You’re going to earn me my gold all over again when you actually manage to kiss Sera. Bull think’s she’ll kill you first- or break her neck jumping out a window.”

“Not entirely outside the realm of possibility.”

“Well.” Varric pretends to look at the paintings on Solas’ wall, the trees stretching up in a way similar to how they’d looked in Dorian’s part of the Fade; with a wolf hidden among the branches, teeth long and eyes red. But Varric has seen this already, many times. Most of the Inner Circle enjoyed coming to see his works as he finished them, which was flattering, if a little disruptive. “I happen to have it on good authority that the Seeker is in the tavern.”

 

When silence greets his comment, he looks over his shoulder with a meaningful look. “ _Alone._ Just drinking.”

 

“Varric. It’s almost as if you’ve put some thought into how to seduce our dear Cassandra.” He says lightly, and Varric chuckles. Perhaps his mind is still whetted by his earlier conversation with their spymaster, but Solas thinks perhaps he hears a strained note to it.

“You’re a funny guy Solas.” He runs a finger along the wall; Not as if to ruin the wet paint, which is clearly dry and matte, but just to touch. It’s a russet orange, with the bluish gray of the trees stretching almost to the second floor landing. “I can hear the wedding bells now.”

“Hm.” Solas says, consideringly. “I suppose one or two drinks might not hurt. Our Seeker after all, is a very lonely woman. Seeking companionship. Perhaps I might take more than just a kiss-”

Varric doesn’t say anything, simply laughs as if Solas said something funny. He shows perhaps a few too many teeth however, and Solas lets himself hum carelessly. “Unless perhaps, someone wishes to call a forfeit?”

Varric tenses, and now Solas knows he’s not imagining the tension in his shoulders, and the almost impressed glare the dwarf was giving him over his smile. “Nice try. But a bet’s a bet, and we already have half the serving staff on the edges of their seats. You have to give the people what they want; It’s a showman’s promise.”

 

“That is so very far from the truth, my friend.”

 

Varric’s facade of careful amusement falls, showing a slightly more honest, and weary grin. “Don’t I know it.”

 

#####

 

Solas enters the tavern, and it’s surprisingly busy. Most of the army is out doing formations with Cullen in the field, all kitted out and sweating under the layers of armor and thick leather. Cooper had seen them off with a hand shading his eyes from the sun, the other cheerfully saluting Cullen on his charger as he led the men out, barking orders and rounding the back to get the party moving. Most of them were farm boys or village folk, and hardly knew how to walk in formation, let alone fight.

The men that'd followed them from Haven, the so-called veterans, were impressively improved. They moved now under the command of either Cullen or Cassandra like a well oiled machine- A miracle Solas didn’t think he’d see. And now that the latest batch of recruits were under the Commander’s thumb, they often found it better to invade the tavern when the usual occupants were out getting harangued by the upper echelons of the Inquisition.

There were two very full tables- and two or three drinkers by themselves- but otherwise it was a clumped, companionable gathering.

All except for Seeker Pentaghast, sitting by herself on the upper floor at one of the tables. It was entirely dark up there, outside the lamps of the first floor and the cheerful fire Maryden was tuning by. The Seeker was a lighthouse against the dark, her small candle keeping her company along with the small assortment of empty cups, and a book lying abandoned by the wayside.

 

“Good evening.”

 

Cassandra looks up, and sighs, turning back to the table, and gesturing carelessly at the bench next to her. “Solas. It is good to see you.”

“I’m sure it is.” He runs his eyes over the cups, and gives her a quirked eyebrow.

Cassandra was flushed, but not with embarrassment. Perhaps with contentment. She rolled here eyes. “Please. As if I would let myself become drunk enough not to be able to parse when you are judging me.”

“I would never judge.” Solas tells her gently, raising his own small cup and bottle in demonstration, and taking his seat next to her.

She peers at his drink curiously, and after he offers, sniffing it. Th harsh sweet smell causes her to wrinkle her nose. “What is _that._ ”

“Alienage bathtub brew.” Solas explains, sipping at his drink, and ignoring the incredulous looks Cassandra gives him. “I find it’s surprisingly palatable, especially the particular kind that Corf brews. He uses insects to distill the drink made from the base root plant; which is the only proper way to brew an elvish drink.”

Cassandra’s eyebrows seem to only go higher.

“Elves are great adherents to an insect diet. Surely you know this?” He is slightly surprised. Especially since, he thinks a little guiltily, he’s shared meals with the Seeker without finding it necessary to share the ingredients.

“No. It is… Good?”

He offers her a sip, and after quite a bit of coughing and surprised eyebrow raising, she nods in agreement. “I must confess, it’s tasty for… Bug wine.”

“It’s actually a liquor.”

Cassandra takes a few drinks of her own wine, slightly watered and chilled with a chunk of ice, to wash the taste from her mouth. An endearing quality that Solas has hardly seen, outside of housewives and poor peasants. A strange habit for a Nevarran noble to have. “Far be it for me to judge. I have often been in the field without rations- Anyone who fights in this war probably has. And it helps nobody to turn your nose up at a fine source of protein.”

“Good to hear. Perhaps I will dust some crickets for our next trip.”

Cassandra narrows her eyes at him, and _here_ he finds a faint trace of tipsiness. “Do not push your luck.”

 

He smiles, and they are silent for a while, sipping their drinks, and enjoying the faint strains of music that come up from below them as they drink. Solas, his liquor, and Cassandra her wine that has no doubtedly grown more watered as the night goes on.

 

It is not the silence Solas has with Dorian, tense with all the things the man is bursting to say, with the motion of tapping fingers and push of comments behind his teeth. Nor is it the silence he enjoys with Vivienne, a slightly frosty, if respectful, armistice. It’s companionable; Despite their difference, he finds the most in common with the Seeker, who is not too proud to change her views, and is as open to change as he wishes half the humans who ran the Chantry were. She’s also unbearably honest, baffled by anybody who would not act as they would wish to be viewed, and have a need for dishonesty. What point is there in lying, to a woman who has nothing to hide? It’s refreshing.

He can guess why Cassandra is here.

Cooper had been uncontrollable with his excitement over the dragon, showing off his new armor that shimmered a faint orange, designed with a Templar in mind, although the symbol on it was that of the Inquisition rather than that of the chantry. Him and Iron Bull have been beside themselves, researching their next target, and discussing options in party position as well as composition. Solas is afraid that he made too good of a showing before, and how he may never escape their escapades.

Cassandra has mentioned her brother Anthony a few times in passing, wistful and still hurting faintly, and it doesn’t take him much to see the comparison. Not after riding behind the two, and seeing the way the young Trevelyan hung on her every word.

Similar to how he imagines Cassandra must have hung on the every word of her elder brother, the infamous dragon slayer.

 

“You are here for a reason?” Cassandra finally asks, in the brief silence between one song and the next.

“Unfortunately.”

“Oh.” Cassandra’s nose wrinkles in faint distaste, and she brings her cup up to her lips, draining it. “ _That._ ”

Solas laughs, sipping his own drink. “Yes. _That._ I’m sorry you find it so distasteful. What’s a little kiss between friends, after all? You will hardly be alone in this, much as I hate to admit it.”

Cassandra flushes, and this time it’s with indignation. “Kissing is not simply a party favor to be handed out. It is- It’s-” She flounders for a moment, before moodily tipping one of her empty cups over with a single finger. “ _Kissing!_ I don’t wish to be party to this silly thing; Tell Varric what you must.”

So. It is not her reputation that she worries for, but the sanctity of romance. Trust someone like Cassandra to be more concerned with giving away kisses, than kissing her friend, and elf.

“Kissing is often used as a form of respect among the Orlesians.” Solas points out. “On the cheeks, or with personal friends, on the mouth. Is it not the same in Nevarra?”

“No. We brush cheeks, or perhaps hands, or both. But we are not so _unhygienic_ as Orlesians.” A morbid country, all too aware of the ease of which disease can spread. Not surprising.

“Elves will kiss among close friends, and experimentation among social groups is encouraged. It helps to promote closeness, and even in the time of Arlathan, the upper social echelons were a tangled mess of interrelationships that would span centuries.” Solas pauses, and looks down at his drink, brow furrowed.  
It’s surprisingly empty. He hasn't been drinking with Dorian or Varric in quite a while- Apparently he’s become loose tongued in his absence.

Ah well.

This seems to strike Cassandra, and she pauses, looking across the table at where the shadows are deepest, and thinking. “It is strange to think of anything that would last so long as centuries. Let alone, love.”

“I’m not sure show much love had to do with it, from what I’ve seen in the Fade.” Solas admits, retrieving the bottle he’d obtained from Corf, and pouring himself another drink. “But elves have always had a very romantic culture- Even the legends that remain, as silly as they are, are mostly centered around the gods love and their relationships. Ghilan’nain is rumored to have been a lover of Andruil, rather than her most devoted in the times before Arlathan. It was assumed that most relationships portrayed between the gods were those of intimate nature, because that is simply how the dalish portray such things. Which might explain their disagreements about the Chant.” He sipped his liquor, and wrinkled his nose at the burn.

Cassandra doesn't interrupt him as he nurses his drink, fingers tapping thoughtfully against his thigh, and the candle lighting across both of their waiting faces.

“Who are we to define love, in degrees, or magnitude?" He finally settles on, when his drink is considerably lower, perhaps still stuck on the sanctity of kisses. "There are people who have loved, who have never touched each other, let alone kissed. Not a single brush of the hand, or even the smell of their hair to keep them comfort at night. Simply gazes from across the room, and written letters so full of passion that the Fade echoed with the mere memories of their longing. Even now, centuries after they are both dead and gone, buried next to the wrong people and on opposite sides of what ever divide separated them.”

He took another sip, and stared at the candle, suddenly being struck with a melancholy that he’s managed to push away for quite some time. “Their bones are nothing more than dust and moldering cloth; but even now, I read their letters and hear their voices, and know that there is nothing anyone, no magister or darkspawn, can ever do that will touch something so pure.”

A song starts below, the halted notes sleepy as Maryden herself was, this late at night. A log cracks and pops in the fireplace, brightening the room temporarily in the flurry sparks. “Perhaps it’s even purer, for never having been physical.”

 

Cassandra stares at him for a moment, her cheeks and nose flushed and hair inky black in the candlelight.

 

“If you are going to talk such about romance, Solas, I supposed I could stand to kiss you.” She announces solemnly, and he gives her a smile. Perhaps he never could have been so honest, if he wasn’t so fond of the woman sitting next to him, pouring herself a measure of his “bug” liquor, and tapping her glass gently against his.

“You are an honest woman, Seeker, and I’m not in the least bit doubtful that you mean that. However, I’d hate for anyone, least of all our dwarfish friend, to accuse me of taking advantage of you.”

“You know as well as I how much it would take for me to make such mistakes. And it is not _this._ ” She dismisses, waving a hand over their drinks. “But I admire your resolve. It is time for me to be off any how.”

Solas stands as she does, and with a playful smile, takes her hand and kisses it across the scarred and thick skinned knuckles, swollen where they’d been broken, probably upon some penitent sinners jaw. _“Until we meet again; May it never so long.”_ He says in elvish.

 

She smiles sweetly back. 

 

The next day, as Solas nurses a small headache in the main hall, as well as a cup of restorative tea, Seeker Cassandra Pentaghast walks up to him in the middle of the busy thoroughfare, grabs him by the front of his robes, and plants a kiss right on his mouth.

It leaves him blinking in surprise, and he’s reminded of the taste of the sweet silkworm liquor that they had shared the night before, as well as the feel of teeth. He thinks of whoever had been Cassandra’s first kiss, and this perhaps it’s for the better that Cole never named any names, because if he knew now he might have done something very dreadful to a man for a simple childhood indiscretion.

She lets him go, and her face is a solid red. There’s some shocked murmuring, and a few soldiers begin shouldering each other and hooting in the manner of most soldiers anywhere, clapping their hands and putting two fingers in their mouths to whistle shrilly. It is all fond, since every single one of these men have followed behind the Divines Right Hand at some point in their lives.

“Never let it be said a Pentaghast can be taken advantage of.” She pats him on the cheek, and turns on heel, marching out of the hall, and snapping at the soldiers to get their lazy asses out to the training field if they have so much pent up energy as to make a spectacle of themselves.

 

Solas turns back to his tea, and his only regret is perhaps that he has not brushed his teeth yet this morning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hahaha I finally got too lazy to translate the elvish. SUCK IT.
> 
> My sure fire way to fix writers block, is I give it a few days, and start a shower. Then I stand in there and wash my hair until inspiration strikes, because I'm a literal cartoon character, and that's how I solve my problems.
> 
> I also write a million other things in the mean time.
> 
> I read the dialogue between Solas and the other characters before I write each chapter, and I thought Cassandra's and Solas' was the most insightful and honest out of any of the characters dialogue. Surprising, since I'd expect them to get along the least.


	10. Cullen

#####

 

Commander Cullen is a hard egg to crack.

 

“Commander! A word, if you please.” Solas says in a hurried rush as he enters Cullen’s office, shutting the door against a brisk wind. This is attempt number three to get the Commander into something as simple as a _conversation_ , and it’s proving to be quite more difficult than he’d imagined.

If he’d known word getting out about the bet would make him take to his heels this way, he would have sworn more people to secrecy. Or at least taken care of the Commander first, he thinks, with perhaps too much of a hunter’s sullen irritation. His quarry is proving hard to pin down. “I believe that-“

 

“Not now Solas! Things to do, I have to- See the quartermaster.” The chair doesn’t fall as Cullen springs from it, but only barely. “Some other time perhaps!” Is the only explanation he gets, as he watches the tail end of the Commanders red cloak whisk around the corner, and out of his office.

An aide standing along the wall gives Solas an uncomfortably perceptive look, mostly hidden under her scout hood, before briskly stacking the papers Cullen has abandoned so quickly. She seems like a sensible girl, and he gives her a small nod that’s returned with a smile.

 

He sighs, and turns, heading out to the courtyard.

 

His fourth attempt finds him in the garden.

 

Dorian and Cullen are seated at a chess set, the former with one leg crossed and his hand fidgeting in quite a telling way on his face, and Cullen with a smug smile.

Dorian is quite adept at chess, it’s true, but he’s also impatient, and his tells are many and varied, as much as he protests otherwise. An excellent opponent for a game of fun, however, which is no doubt the source of the Commander’s good mood. It’s a nice change from the usual discomfort Solas is normally greeted with, although he knows he’d never be able to get such a reaction. Not from Cullen.

Solas is not only an apostate, but an elvhen apostate. One who has evaded Templar capture for decades; and not only that, he’s living proof that the Circle is perhaps not quite as necessary as the Chantry has dictated. He’s of iron control, and flawless magic. Although he knows his spellcasting is nothing like Vivienne or Dorian's, as rote as any other Circle educated mage, it’s arguably just as effective. ( _More_ , if you ask him, but that is an argument for him to have with his colleagues. Not to browbeat a former Templar with.)

 

So he understands why Cullen may be uncomfortable being cornered by him. Or conversing with him. Or, if word has already gotten out (which is looking very likely), kissing him.

 

When the Commander spots him across the garden, and leaps to his feet, Solas unkindly thinks he may be acting a little undignified. This whole thing is entirely unnecessary. Especially as Cullen takes the door behind him to make his getaway, which Solas knows for a fact is the longer way to get back to the main hall, if he isn’t in fact making a stop in the kitchens. Perhaps to hide in the cupboard, he thinks a little bitterly. And leaving the game unfinished as well.

 

He says as much to Dorian as he takes the vacated seat.

 

“You can hardly blame the man. You look as if you’re going to pull pull teeth, not sweep him off of his feet.” Dorian comments, knocking over his own king and grimacing at the board. Jumpy he may be, but Cullen is quite the strategist. The chess board is a massacre.

Solas scoffs, and retrieves the bottle from under the table. From the looks of things Dorian has finished half by himself, while Cullen has nursed barely a glass. Solas helps himself, ignoring Dorian’s pointedly prodding feet. “This whole farce is more trouble than it’s worth. And rather more than three sovereigns.” He sniffs it, and deems it acceptable. The finer wines would only be proper after the sunsets, but this lighter wine is something he didn’t mind having around lunchtime.

“Three sovereigns can get you quite a lot of kisses at any brothel from here to the Seheron. It’s not the _bet’s_ fault that you can’t be convincing.” Dorian finally leaves his face alone, smoothing his mustache and uncrossing his legs. Every gesture brings attention to the jewelry on his fingers and ears, like a magpie showing off it’s bits of treasure. Solas finds it quite funny, the way Dorian presents himself. Always switching and cycling his clothes and jewelry, to cause the illusion of having a larger wardrobe than he does in reality. It's quite effective.

“It’s also not my fault that our Commander is a blushing _virgin._ ” Solas takes a sip of wine, and begins resetting the board. He hasn’t played on a physical board in quite a while, and it’s a nice change of pace. Especially without the motion of a horse to distract him.

 

Dorian makes a thoughtful humming noise. “Now. I wouldn’t say _that._ ” He sets his side, black. After carefully placing the pieces, Solas takes a moment to sip another swallow, and moves the first piece.

 

Dorian follows immediately after, and Solas raises an eyebrow.

 

“Shut up. It’s an excellent strategy.” The human defends.

 

“If you believe that, no wonder our Commander keeps defeating you.” Solas disagrees pleasantly, taking some time, before moving his mage out from the back of the board.

 

Dorian glares and moves another piece. “Why don’t you have a talk with our dearest ambassador. If anyone will know how to solve your little problem, it will be her. The woman is a hopeless romantic- I’ve seen her exchanging favors with Blackwall like they’re in some kind of sordid novel. Sickening.”

Solas, who has seen Dorian’s reading material on the arm of his chair while he slept, makes no comment.

“Perhaps. But as to your earlier comment- The Commanders virtue?” Dorian looks surprised, and a little guilty. “I wonder what you could _possibly_ have meant?”

Dorian moves his piece, and takes a whole trio of contemplative swallows. When he sets the glass down he rolls his eyes. “We chat, perhaps... More than we should while playing chess. I won’t say another word, besides to the affect that our dearest Commander isn’t nearly the wilting flower that we think.” Dorian taps this nose, before looking down at his cup and frowning.

 

He dumps the rest under the table, and they finished their game in companionable silence. Even with these new facts to turn over, he still soundly trounces Dorian’s game, two out of three.

 

#####

 

When Solas enters Josephine’s office, he’s nothing but grateful that Leliana isn’t there.

 

He wouldn’t go so far as to say he’s scared of the Spymaster. Perhaps acknowledging that she’s played her hand, and deserves the respect that only avoidance can bring. He’s playing a game with her that both of them know the rules to, and it would be better for everyone if the final round was not played out within Skyholds walls.

 

So avoidance it is, for now.

 

Josephine has moved the furniture back where it belongs, and with barely a week remaining before they head to Haramshiral, her desk is a mess of invitations, reservations, wardrobe designs and samples of fabric. There’s two different kinds of carriages on display, and only one will be chosen. The dwarves that work in Skyhold are fast, and he has no doubt that their transportation will be done no matter how late she leaves it.

 

“Ah! Solas. I have been meaning to speak with you.” Josephine looks up as he shuts the door behind him, and he feels sheepish at the admonishing glare she gives him. “An elvish tradition, you said?”

“Ah. Yes. I suppose I owe some apologies-“

Her glare starts to tremble, before finally breaking with a small smile. She laughs, bright and cheerful. “No matter. It was quite funny! Vivienne was put off for the rest of the day- And I suppose I can forgive you for embarrassing me in front of some Dalish diplomats, if it gets you out of debt.”

“That is… Quite the dreadful way of putting it.”

“I have done far worse in the name of diplomacy.” Josephine reassures him, before gathering her skirts and standing from her chair. With the same grace and regality that any queen would admire, Solas observed, as she came around and linked arms with him. “But come. Let us talk. I believe you came for a reason?”

Solas follows her out of her office, into the pleasantly lit corridor that led to the war room. It's very private- Nobody comes through here but the advisors and the Inquisitor, and it was even less well traveled than the ramparts. Part of the wall had crumbled a long time ago, leaving what the Inquisitor affectionately called his ‘mountain view’. It made the corridor airy, and bright, smelling of the cool breeze that carries the scent of vegetation up the mountainside.

“I am having… Problems, with Cullen.” Solas frowns, beleaguered by the sudden fit of laughter coming from Josephine. “I realize there is no time limit, but if I can’t manage to wrangle our Commander, then I may have to face kissing rather a lot of horses as a forfeit. _After_ having to kiss almost everyone in the Inquisition anyway. You understand my dilemma.”

“Well. We _do_ require your expertise. I would hate for you to flee Skyhold due to outstanding kissing debts.” She manages to get out through giggles, her accent thickened both with good humor, and probably the whole silly situation itself.

“Yes. That would be a shame.” Solas says drily, waiting for her to get herself gathered. It’s a process, and finally she gasps, sighing, and wipes a few tears from her cheeks.

“Alright. For our Commander? You need to be aggressive.”

Not quite what he expected.

“Cullen does not like not knowing what to do, he is a man of action! You pursuing him is fine and good, but he will never submit if you do not _corner_ him. Get him alone, and cut off his exits.” Her eyes glitter, and she leans in conspiratorially as a particularly hard gust of wind causes a faint whistling in the ramparts.

“Then, you go in for the-“ Her solemn and serious expression twitches faintly with the giggles she’s suppressing, and Solas casts his eyes skyward. _’Venhedis.’_ “-Kill.” She smacks his arm gently for his patronizing expression.

 

“I would never suspect such underhanded advice from you, our dearest diplomat.” He lies, feigning a paternal disappointment.

 

“I am Antivan. We are the best at pursuing what it is we want. It is why we make the best assassins." She pauses uncertainly. "Don’t let anyone hear that I said as much- The last thing we need is someone to hear me disparaging my countrymen.” She pats Solas’ arm. “Cullen is a handsome and much pursued man in Skyhold. I am not telling you to _assault_ the man, heavens. But make a better showing. He will never stop unless you _stop_ him!” She thrust a fist up, as if cheering for a team on the gaming field. Solas chuckles.

“So you are saying I should be more like the Iron Bull.”

“Perhaps.” She grins. “There are worse people you could model yourself after, if it is kisses you are after.”

 

“I suppose you are correct.” Solas sighs, already changing his plans. Where he thought that the Commander would require a delicate hand, it appears a blunter approach may be the only option. The approach he perhaps likes the least.

 

“Of course I am. Now, I must speak to you about those dancing lessons you promised Vivienne-“

 

#####

 

Solas doesn’t knock this time.

 

“Solas!” Cullen looks up, startled from his desk. “Ah, uh yes. Hello.” He starts to stand, unsurely.

It is late at night, and the remaining candles that had not burned out are dim, flickering things. It is made up for with a Fade-Light, and Solas has the suspicion that it would remain on long after the rest of Skyhold has gone to sleep, as Cullen stayed up and worked on reports.

Since his heavy crimson cloak is draped over the back of his chair, and his hair disheveled as if he has been running his fingers through it all night, he knows his assumption is probably correct.

“I’m glad I caught you Commander. I wanted to talk to you about something-“

“Yes, wonderful.” Cullen looks as if he’d still be trying desperately to climb out the door, or window, or perhaps hole in the roof, but instead he comes to the same conclusion that Solas came to. Which is it would be terribly undignified for the Commander of the Inquisitions armies to break his neck trying to get away from a man perhaps half his size.

 

Who comes bearing gifts. Solas shuts the door pointedly, as if cutting off any avenue of exit, and there's a minute slump of the Commanders shoulders as he accepts defeat. _Excellent._

 

“I talked to Trevelyan, who told me you may be… Having trouble.” Solas begins hesitantly. This is the tricky part, he knows. To get Cullen to accept his help, without upsetting him. “Health-wise. He asked me to see what I could do to help you.”

Not quite a lie. Solas _has_ noticed that Cullen was ill- It didn’t take much.  
Mages could smell lyrium on Templars. It wasn’t a well known fact, and Solas had rolled his eyes when he heard Dorian become bafflingly attracted to their young Inquisitor. He’d commented on his smell; In Tevinter, the templars were little more than glorified errand boys. He probably had no idea what southern Templars were capable of.

 

The nauseating way him and the Inquisitor fawned over each other, however, could not be entirely attributed to smell.

 

Immediately however, despite attempting to be delicate, Cullen’s shoulders tense, getting to his feet and shoulders squaring somewhere around his ears. “And what did he tell you?”

“Nothing but that you were in some pain.” Cullen relaxes, still wary, eyes flicking towards the door as if making sure an aide isn't about to come in. Solas reaches behind himself at the realization, and latches it. He’s leaning against the door, one foot on top of the other as the floor was _freezing_ this time of night, and apparently there wasn’t enough rugs in the Inquisition to furnish a simple office. (They were all probably in Dorian’s alcove.)

The fire’s almost out, down to coals, and most of the light came from the seafood green fade-light.

“The rest I deduced myself.” He holds up a hand as Cullen angrily rounds the desk, color high in his cheeks above the paler sheen of illness that still clung to his jaw. As he got closer, Solas noticed a sheen of sweat across his forehead, as well as a familiar sickly sweet smell.  
Elven noses weren’t as sensitive as qunari, but they were considerably better than a human’s, and Solas knew the smell of the body fighting against itself when he smelled it.

“Calm, Commander. I am not here to threaten you- I’m here to offer you help.” Cullen pauses, uncertain, perhaps four feet from him.  
He looks much smaller without his cloak, and Solas realizes the straps of his breast plate are undone, dangling. Like a child who had begun to take off their heavy winter clothes, and grown too sleepy to finish. Although Solas knows it was probably pain and weariness that kept this particular child.

He feels a surge of dissatisfaction. Both with the Inquisition’s way of dealing with such a serious illness, one that has probably never progressed this far before and one that is clearly taking a toll on one of their leaders that he feels they can ill afford to lose. And also with Cullen himself- No fire, despite probably joint pain and chills, no ewer of water. His bed is up a blighted _ladder_.

“Sit.” He says, perhaps a bit more briskly than before, and perhaps Cullen had taken in Solas’ observation of the room, and the steadily darkening of his expression, because he shuts his mouth, still flushing, and round the desk slowly again to sit back in his chair.

 

Solas waits a beat, before nodding in satisfaction, and letting both of his feet rest on the cold flagstones. He waves a hand, brightening the fire and banishing some of the chill in the room. He glances up in puzzlement, and snorts when he sees the hole in the roof.

“I- I told them we require the supplies elsewhere.” Cullen offered, lamely, as Solas walked over to him, and moved the Commander forward slightly. He began undoing the armor, reluctant to ask the man to stand when he was so clearly tired, and gritting teeth against a migraine.

 

“And I imagine when the walls close in, it’s nice to look up and see the stars, hm?”

 

Cullen stiffens, and Solas undoes the last buckle, lifting the man’s arms and taking the breastplate and gorget off, still connected and all in one piece. He moves to the corner to place it on the stand, and decides to leave the greaves and talberd for later. The gauntlets at least are on the stand, probably for the ease of paperwork.

He turns back, facing Cullen’s crossed arms and suspicious glare.

 

He quirks his head to one side, and waits.

 

“You are very knowledgable for someone I haven’t spoken to about any of this.” Cullen finally gets out, uneasily. The fire flickers, and it brings color to his face that hadn’t been there in the unflattering fade-light. “Is it really so easy to see my weakness?”

“For one who has seen it many times before? Yes.” Solas comes behind him, and pulls out the bottle he’s brought with him, pouring a small amount onto his hands. “Remove your shirt.”

“I beg your pardon?” Cullen starts to stand, and to Solas’ amusement, he sees the flush spread all the way down to the first knob of his spine, where stretched collar of his shirt shows the beginnings of freckles.

“Calm yourself Ser Cullen. I am not here for your virtue.” Solas lies easily, using one elbow to push the Commander gently back into sitting at his office chair. His hands are covered in liniment, which is sharp and minty smelling; It soothes his nose from the sickly sweet smell of withdrawal. “I am here as a friend, and a colleague.”

 

After a few moments of blushing hesitation, Cullen moves his hands up, undoing the laces of his shirt, and peeling it off over his head. It's charming. How Solas imagines seducing a farm girl would be.

And then the shirt comes off, and it's very clear that this is no blushing maiden.

 

Solas is vaguely impressed. He knew from the vibrations in the Fade that their Commander suffered from rather drastic night terrors; Memories, most of them. It wasn’t surprising, considering what he’d gathered from gossip talk and his previous credentials in Kirkwall and Kinloch. What he hadn’t known, was the outside apparently matched the inside.

There are clear claw marks raking down the right side of his back, in two separate swipes almost as even as a chess board. A larger than human hand, perhaps a drasolisk, or an envy demon, that had hooked the Templar underneath them and torn through armor as easily as burlap. Burns and smaller wounds scattered over the skin in the manner of anyone who fought mages on a regular basis; Although one particularly drastic one changes the color of his skin from his lower back, to part way down the inside of his arm all the way to the elbow- A shiny pinkish white that was long healed, and stretched the skin taut.

The rest is the pale ferelden white of someone who saw harsh winters and brief summers, with the thick shoulders and arms, strong ropy muscles stretching and flexing as the Commander shifts uncertainly.

 

Probably because Solas has been staring in contemplation for just a beat too long.

 

“Quite the collection you have here.” He rubs his hands together to warm and spread the oil, a mixture of crystal grace, elfroot, and some of the essence of flame that he had found right below the point in the air that Trevelyan had shut a rift. “Some of these look quite old.”

“Yes. Harrowings… Don’t always go well.” He explains, sounding more grounded. Although the flush still hasn’t left.

 

Solas leans in, and rests most of his weight on the heels of his hands as he digs into Cullen’s shoulders, right to either side of the spine. He twists, and immediately Cullen’s head tilts forward, a small noise of satisfaction coming muffled from his chest. He let's the weight do most of the work, acknowledging the fact that he's not strong enough to be as effective as he'd like on someone so much larger than him.

Solas works there for a few moments, on the spot where the tension begins, before smoothing up mostly to the neck, under the jaw where there are sensitive glands and muscles that tighten in illness. Although his hands are small, they’re strong, and he manages to hook his thumbs back somewhere around Cullen’s ears, letting them dig in slightly, in small circular motions at the same time he presses in under the soft and unshaven shadow of the jawline.

“Maker.” Cullen breathes out, and this time Solas flushes faintly, looking up at the ceiling and closing his eyes briefly.  
He was going to get Varric back for these ridiculous escapades. It was going to be humiliating, it was going to _possibly_ be violent, and he will call in every favor he has drifting around Skyhold to do it. “That feels _wonderful._ ”

“I’m sure. Fereldens have no idea how to treat the human body;" Solas comments flippantly, smoothing his thumbs down around the hairline. "I learned how to give massages from a former Tamarassan.”

“And where was that?”

“No where you’re familiar with.” Solas says pleasantly, moving his hands briefly up to Cullen’s temples, tangling in the almost coarse, pale hair there, before moving his hands back down to his shoulders. He would suggest going somewhere Cullen could lay down, so he could do the rest of the knotted tension he knows the Commander carried under his armor; But he thinks that might do more harm than good, when the human had a stroke.

So he digs his fingertips in as far as he can, down below the sharp wings of his shoulder blades, and Cullen stretches out and forward like a contented cat, and _this_ time, it is definitely a groan.

 

Solas’ fingers still.

 

He regrets it when immediately, Cullen springs to his feet, almost tripping in his haste to turn and face Solas. One hand goes to the back of his neck, and he seems to forget his desk is behind him until his legs hit it. He almost sits on it, and a stick of charcoal rolls off to clink to the floor.

“I- Uh, I’m so sorry, I appreciate the help!" Maker save him from shy humans. He thought Cassandra would be the more difficult one.

"This is the best my head has felt in quite some time!” Cullens say all in a rush, and Solas’ raises one eyebrow at him, hands still raised in the position they’d been in when Cullen had been underneath him. He hasn’t moved. “You have very talented fingers- That is!” Cullen’s hand shoots down from his neck, to join the other one where it’s crossed over his chest. The red goes all the way down, and Solas idly wonders how the Commander managed to get freckles, when spring is barely here and thawing out the keep. “What i mean to say is that you have very nice hands- Oh, maker.”

“Relax Commander. _Cullen._ ” The human’s face flushes if possible even more, and Solas doesn’t bother to wipe his hands off. They're still warmed and scented, and the only thing he has is his robes anyway.

_’Aggressive. Be aggressive.’_ He tells himself, wondering once again _why this is what he’s been forced to._

He steps forward; the chair, and one of his arms does an effective job of blocking the Commander in, while not making it so overtly obvious that he should be escaping. Solas’ other hand comes up to feel the mans forehead, frowning. “You are still quite flushed.”

“Mm! Yes, quite.” Cullen manages in a strangled voice, holding himself so still he might be made of stone. Solas leans in closer, letting his eyes shutter partway. As if scrutinizing. But with the firelight, and the smell and heat of the oil still warming Cullen’s ears and scenting Solas hands, it’s quite intimate.

Cullen’s throat moves, and Solas hears the faint dry click. “I should- Um. Be going to bed.”

“I thought you had work to be done still.” Solas points out, without backing away in the slightest.  
He’s now almost completely pressed against the Commander, one hand still on his forehead.At this point they’re sharing breath, and it’s tense. Solas, waiting to see if he’ll take the bait. Cullen, with his eyes darting nervously, and the flush and opening of his pupils indicating that he was intrigued. Like a dog, presented with a treat it wasn’t sure it was allowed to have, and was looking for it’s owner to come in and swat it on the nose.

“I. I- “

“Perhaps it can wait until morning?” Solas says, his hand moving from Cullen’s forehead- as his head bobs a hurried and slightly panicked affirmative,-to his neck. His fingertips rest lightly on the nape, and the warm minty tingle of the oil still left draws a delicate shudder down Cullen’s spine that brings him if anything closer.

“Good. As your healer,” And here, Solas leans in closer, until their lips are almost touching, one hand now moving from the desk to rest lightly on Cullen’s hip, drawing a gasp. “I’m going to have to insist on bed rest.”

He kisses him, chastely and suddenly, and the taste of lyrium is so faint as to be almost gone. Perhaps it’s still in the bones, he thinks idly, as Cullen stiffens again. But Solas’ thinks it is perhaps in the manner of a hunting hound, finely bred and sensing an opportunity, the muscles in his bare chest almost quivering, before Solas finds himself promptly turned around, and pushed against the desk.

_’Ah. There we are.’_ Solas thinks smugly, as Cullen’s tongue sweeps into his mouth, one leg knocking his knee aside, and both hands placed on the desk to either side of Solas’ hips. He sends a mental thank you to Josephine, and enjoys the rather enthusiastic, and charming efforts of the Commander. _’All he needed was a little push.’_

The taste of lyrium is stronger, within his saliva, an analytical part of Solas thinks. Perhaps he tastes somewhat the same, if the desperate, hungry noise Cullen makes into the heat of their mouth is anything to go by. The kiss is strong, almost bruising, and Solas knows his lips are already going to be tender in a combination of the bristle scratching the skin and the desperate, biting suck that draw his bottom lip into Cullen's mouth. He returns it with an indulgent smile, and a rather dirtier kiss that involves his sharper teeth to interesting effect, one of Cullen's hands moving to cup his neck and jaw in one large, callused hand that was still cool and dry with illness.  
The other moves to his lower back, drawing the two of them together lower, and Solas starts to think perhaps he should gentle this a bit before he gets rather more than a kiss.

 

It's like piercing a vein of oil that has been pent up for far too long, pressure building, and he makes a not to orchestrate some kind of relief for Cullen, if this is the state the poor man gets into after however long he suspects he's been without companionship.

 

Their mouths separate, Solas rather more out of breath than he’d intended, and Cullen trails one more kiss onto his jaw, back to his temple, and when he bites lightly at Solas’ ear, he actually _gasps,_ and it draws a laugh from Cullen that has Solas also chuckling, putting his hands up and pushing the heavy warm blanket of human off of him.

He goes easily, the flush almost completely gone except for across his nose and cheeks, and twin brushes of it across his shoulders. His eyes are wide and dark, and Solas knows now why he’s such sought after target among the serving girls. He looks like a character from a tapestry, all disheveled hair across his forehead, and bright red lips that Solas doesn’t remember biting. But he must have, if the small pinpricks of red are anything to go by.

 

“That should do it.” He pats Cullen on the shoulder, giving him one last kiss on the cheek, simply because he’s suddenly much fonder of the human than he’d been before, and pressed the bottle of lotion into his hand. “That is for you. I would be more than happy to give you another massage, although next time, I promise to be more… _Professional._ ”

“A bet’s a bet.” Cullen confirms- causing Solas to roll his eyes- and smiles gratefully as he shuts the bottle in a drawer. “I-“ He stops, hesitantly, and sheepishly. “Thank you Solas. This was very kind of you.”

“It is no trouble at all." And it isn't, not really. "I only wish you’d come to me sooner.” Solas lets himself off of the desk, brushing his robes off for want of somewhere to fix his eyes. “I wish you a good evening, Commander.” 

 

“Solas.” Cullen nods his head, a small twinkle of amusement in his eyes, and Solas lets himself out, making sure to leave the fire warmed and fresh.

 

Josephine is on the other side of the door, holding a stack of papers, and burning so brightly red that he can make it out even in the dimness of the night-time ramparts, and under the duskiness of her skin. The candle on her board is out for the trip across the archway, the wind too strong for such delicate flame, and Solas takes her free hand to shake it lightly in the brief pause that occurs when their eyes meet.

“Thank you for the advice Madame Montilyet.” He says, smiling, and she giggles a little, breaking the silence, eyes fixed on her feet. “But I must insist you let our Commander rest for now- Whatever you have can wait until morning.”

“I- Yes. I suppose it can.” She looks down at her papers and sighs, offering the same free arm to Solas. “Would you mind terribly walking me back to my office?”

 

“It would be my pleasure.” He informs her gravely, linking an arm through hers, and enjoying the cool night time air playing across his hot, and slightly flushed face.

 

And it was.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ######
> 
>  
> 
> Okay, so this was a tricky one, because I couldn't come up with a very feasible way to get Cullen to stand still long enough to get smooched. As a result, it has some more setup than previous chapters. Haha. Also there's more Josephine, because I feel like she didn't get enough screen time, and she's my beautiful disney princess, so.
> 
> Did you know if you pick the Templar specialization, Dorian comments on how good you smell! :0 Oh my goodness it was SO CUTE
> 
> Also, I kept breaking down in giggles while writing this, because I never realized how many rare pairs I was going to be writing. Or how much work it would be to set each one up realistically. It's CULLEN KISSING SOLAS.
> 
> I hope I did okay! Judging by all of your guys SWEET AND BEAUTIFUL COMMENTS you all like it, so I'm touched. I read all your comments before going to bed at night so it brings me good dreams. ;o;
> 
>  
> 
> I'm going to be honest, I didn't think I'd do this much work on a short prompt, but it's been fun, and I'm learning a lot. Just two more left! Sera, and the Inquisitor.


	11. Sera (And Jenny)

#####

 

A wad of spit and pulp hits the back of Solas’ head, and he shuts his eyes wearily.

 

Sera makes a rude raspberry noise from high up above him, two fingers going up, before she nimbly clambers back over the tavern roof, swearing and the clinking of roofing tiles the only thing to be heard. It’s a clear, sunny, springtime evening, and Solas is soon going to be resorting to murder.

 

Iron Bull lets out a low whistle as Solas wipes the back of his head off, grimacing at the mess and shaking it off into the dirt.

“Wow. Still haven’t-“

“No.” Solas answers flatly, juggling his books and staff a moment so he can wipe his hand off on his robes. “And if I’m being entirely honest, I’m not sure how I’m _going_ to.”

 

They’re standing by the practice ring, Iron Bull for once simply supervising as his Tevinter associate, Krem, barks out short sharp orders and runs the rest of the squad through their paces. In total, the company is perhaps twenty, and with all of the missions Trevelyan has them running, Solas knows the captain has less time than before to spend with his crew. They’ve been on missions without him, and Solas is distinctly reminded of a mother bird, clucking over a bunch of hatchlings every time he greets them as they come back to Skyhold.

Doesn’t mean his chest doesn’t look puffed up with pride, as Krem cracks one of the archers on the head and draws a yelp from the woman.

“Arms up, back straight, or did I not get the news that we’re asking Corypheus to dance instead of sticking him full of arrows?” He barks, and the woman nods as rapidly as she can as she adjusts her stance.

 

“I’m surprised. Although, I guess if you were going to hit a wall in this non stop caravan of romance, it _would_ be Sera.” Bull continues conversationally.

“If a wall were vulgar. And spiteful. And sabotaged the legs of my chairs.” Solas informs Bull grimly, as the qunari helps him get ahold of his books, large gray hands almost spanning the entire cover of one particular volume.

 

“Well.” Bull helps tip the rest of the books into his arms, and grins toothishly. “You know what? I bet I know just the guys to help you out. And one of them comes in a bottle.”

 

Which is how he finds himself in the tavern with Dorian, Bull, and Varric, all four of them splitting a bottle of maros-lok.

 

“Tell me again how this is going to go better than last time?” Dorian asks Bull warily, grimacing after the burn of his drink has left his throat, and taking a quick sip of ale.

“Because.” Bull says succinctly, and clearly, after having a third of the bottle completely to himself. “This time, there’s four of us.”

 

“Three, if you count Solas and Varric as half each.”

 

“I’ve been drinking Tevinter altus’ under the table since before you were shitting in your knappies.” Varric responds cheerfully, throwing his own drink back, and politely burping into his hand. He’s been known to hoard a table to himself most days he was back in Skyhold- Corf had simply sighed and accepted this, since he was also known to hold court on such days, drawing in plenty of patronage from the Inquisitor and his Inner Circle.

Papers were currently sprawled across his personal table, most crossed fervently out and a few crumpled. Dorian was pawing through them with his tankard at his elbow, and stroking his mustache thoughtfully. Solas had been intending to bring the books and papers for Dorian’s perusal when he had first encountered the Iron Bull, but apparently critiquing Varric’s awful manuscripts takes precedence.

 

“What, in the blight riddles world, do you mean, ‘eyes like limpid pools’?” Dorian asks with a faint curl to his lip, and Varric shrugs.

“Sounds good, right?”

“Good Maker, _no_. You’re describing a horse.”

“Everyone loves a good animal character. Sells books.”

 

“Really?” Dorian seems a common combination of unsurprised, and completely disappointed. “Well. Cheers, then.” He takes another swallow, and the fumes alone are enough for Solas to blink slowly.

 

He nurses his own drink considerably slower, books abandoned where Bull had cheerfully dropped them, and mind instead turning over the Sera problem. Apparently, he’s not the only one, as Bull finally sets the cap on the bottle after they’ve collectively made a large dent in the amount, belches hugely, and sighs in satisfaction.

 

“Alright. So. Our boy has two left.”

 

The other two immediately know what Bull is talking about, which does nothing for Solas’ state of mind. He’d almost convinced himself no one else was invested in this ridiculous venture besides Varric and himself. And possibly Bull, for some unfathomable, and probably lewd reason.

“He can’t corner her. She’ll eat him alive.” Dorian immediately, and slightly unsteadily announces. “I’ve heard her talking- She has three knives in her belt and some insects that have no business being anywhere near _anyone’s_ pockets.”

If he keeps drinking every time someone says something that makes him despair, he’ll never make it back to his rooms, he tells himself sternly, staring at the table.

“No, no. Sera’s a fox. She’s wily.” Bull taps the side of his nose, the only sign of his inebriation a slight twinkling in his one eye, and Solas braces himself for the coming conversation with just one more drink. “You have to trick her into coming to you. Now, what will get Sera down off the roof? Metaphorically, and- heh- literally speaking?”

 

“Food.” Dorian offers, and Bull shakes his head.

 

“Nah. She’s got plenty of that tucked away. And she won’t take bribery.”

 

“Some kind of challenge? Buttercup loves to lord it up over people.” Varric scribbles something down on a paper, grimaces, and crumples it up. “Damn. No, that won’t work. We’d never be able to make it believable.” He re-dips his quill, before chewing on it thoughtfully, fingers tapping on the wood. Solas isn’t sure whether it’s one of his stories he’s scribbling down, the current conversation, or perhaps worst of all, a combination of both.

 

“Pride, perhaps?” Solas ventures, but even as he says it, he knows that this whole discussion is futile, and refuses to dignify the issue at hand with anything so base as a _sulk._

Sera is like a cat. No one will be able to get her to do something, unless she _wants_ to.

 

Maryden starts a tune in the corner, one Solas recognizes from- Well. From every village in the south, if he’s being honest. Something about Andraste’s faithful dog. Dorian immediately moans at the first few chords, leaning his head down to rest it in his hand, crumpling one of the pages slightly.

“Bloody hell I hate this song.”

 

“I like it.” Cole says quietly from the bench next to Dorian, causing the man to start enough as to spill a little of his drink. Solas isn’t sure, but he would swear there was a faint steaming as it ate into the table.

 

“ _Kaffas!_ Cole, you nearly gave me a heart attack.” Dorian unsteadily places his cup on the table, giving Cole an exasperated look. The boy is perched on his seat as if he’s about to fly away at any moment, feet tucked under him and hands gripping the edge as if for balance. Solas knows though, that no matter how unsteady or confused Cole looks, he’s arguably the most graceful of the Inner Circle, and unlikely to leave his seat even if Bull picked the whole bench up and shook it around. “ You _would_ like the song about a flea bitten mongrel. Didn’t Dennet have to chase you away from those puppies in the stable?”

“They missed their mother. I had to show them that the horses wouldn’t hurt them.” Says Cole almost primly, eyes fixed on Maryden as she begins the opening chords, to much clapping from the soldiers.

“I’m sure.” Dorian wrinkles his nose delicately, and Varric chuckles.

“We’re going to have some mabari war hounds in no time, if you keep it up kid.”

 

Cole is silent for a moment, before turning to Solas with a frown. Bull has carefully, and methodically, in the manner of the very drunk, poured a small measure of maras-lok into a wooden cup, and pushed it over for Cole with one finger. Normally Solas would disapprove, but he’s beginning to think Bull severely underestimated the size of the bottle, as well as the size of their collective livers. “I know how to get Sera to kiss you.”

“Oh?” Solas is intrigued. he doesn’t know why he didn’t come to cole for help in the first place. He has insight that no one else at this table could match. “And how, may I ask, do I get the hellion to stay still long enough?”

 

“The same way I did you.” Cole serenely takes a sip of his drink to the immense approval of Bull, as casually as one might drink a glass of water. He looks down at it after taking a few steady gulps, brow wrinkled faintly. Dorian pats him on the shoulder consolingly at the small, confused coughs.

“You have to get her a present.”

 

#####

 

Solas pours the remainder of his cup into Cole’s, leaving the young man pinned to the Iron Bull’s side with one large arm draped companionably over his shoulder, and a look of pleased surprise on his face as Varric grills him for ideas on how to fix his manuscript.

Dorian pours himself another drink.

Solas ignores all of this in favor of leaving the tavern, pleasantly loose limbed and warm and enjoying the balmy night time air that has fallen over Skyhold as they sat in the tavern. The stars are bright and clear without the almost constant snow storms they had been suffering since arriving here, and it's nostalgic to look up and unsteadily trace the familiar patterns of constellations as he makes his was back to his tower.

 

What would Sera like?

 

What he knows about Sera, begrudgingly, is that he feels in the depths of his soul that there is something more to the silly little urchin.

 

Once, when he was crossing the archway on his way to out of the gates to collect herbs in an early storm, he looked down from the rain-lashed and slick stones to see her looking up at the sky, eyes fixed on the clouds so virulent that they’re practically boiling. He felt a familiar thrill somewhere deep in his chest at the sight, actually pausing with his cloak wrapped thick and warm around him, and wondered briefly if he should go down and say something.

But that moment, the way she is when no one is watching, barely blinking and smiling so sweetly up at the stone gray sky; He felt as if he was invading her privacy. She opened her hands and turns them palm down, water running in rivulets to patter down onto the tavern roof. No one else could see, this time of day and at this angle, and Solas left, feeling a small amount of guilt, as well as a puzzling surge of interest. 

 

Or sometimes, when they crossed a piece of forest, he could see how fearful she became, jumpy. She somehow felt the weight of history that she could never know, could ever even _begin_ to guess, that he himself has to search for in the depths of the Fade until he can even glimpse the merest echoes.

But Sera grumbled about ‘elfiness’ and left arrows in the shape of a phallus on a stretching oak tree. Probably never to know for sure, that the forest they traversed was the sight of a great and deadly battle, that they had been walking across hundreds, if not thousands, of moldering dead bodies under the thick blanket of roots and greenery.

 

Even if she hates magic, fears it with the same dumb terror that a small animal might fear the sight of a forest fire, she cares about people more. To the point where he’s seen her stand up to people easily twice, sometimes _thrice_ , her diminutive size; All for the sake of her own perception of justice and fairness. And unlike most people who seek justice, Solas knows it is not because of her own sake. Because of some perceived slight or mistreatment she suffered, although he knows she must have suffered much. She simply… Cares.

Although, it isn’t much of an act of bravery to stand up to such enemies when he has _also_ seen her slice the ear off of a Templar’s head without ever removing the helmet, a clinging limpet of fury and jumbled swear words that creates a maelstrom of chaos in any battle she’s in. How an archer draws so much of a fight around herself, Solas will never know.

 

Despite everything he knows (probably more than any one would suspect he knows about their rogue companion), he has no idea what present might be the right thing to earn himself a kiss.

 

It’s only later that evening, as he’s searching through his paints and playing with the idea of giving Sera something to perhaps hone her artistic talents on, when he hears a faint scuffle.

He turns, and can’t help the small smile he tries to hide as Cole furtively backs into his atrium, cradling something small to his chest and looking only the slightest bit flushed and unsteady. He’s still blinking in the slow, wide way that Solas suspects may be his own way of being drunk, although you’d never know it, beyond the small startled looks he gives every time he’s struck with some passing thought of fancy from a stranger that he no longer has the faculties to parse. It's not uncommon for Cole to come find him at this time of night, when the Inquisitor, or Bull or Varric were busy, and Solas turns his full attention onto him as he pauses uncertainly just inside the door.

 

“Cole?” He looks up, as if startled, and abruptly holds out the bundle he’s been cradling, as if Solas had demanded it.

 

It’s a kitten.

 

Small, and orange, and incredibly ragged looking.

 

"Oh- Hm. And what do we have here?" Solas makes a noise of surprise and crosses the room to pick it carefully from Coles rather cold hands, and brings it into his own arms. He settles it in the crook of his arm, limp and blinking in an odd parody of the young man in front of him. “Wherever did you find her?”

“Her mother snuck in the caravan, all the way from the base of the mountain. The rats here have never seen cat, and she got fat, before she had her kittens.” Cole reaches out a careful finger and scratches the bedraggled and thin thing behind one ear. “Mother got stepped on by one of Dennet’s horses. The rest are quiet now, small, painful aches in their bellies that sent them to sleep.”

Solas frowns, and looks up to see Cole staring intently at the small creature, his scarred and thin hand slowly stroking it’s head. Theres a fine tremor there. A young boy who starved to death, alone and forgotten, and he brings him this.

“Is this about Sera?” He asks, carefully, turning to his desk, and settling in his chair so the kitten can curl in his lap. It is thin, starved, and Solas pulls his abandoned dinner to him. He dips a finger in the broth, and slowly feeds drops to the small pink mouth opening up so eagerly.

“She likes helping as much as I do.” Cole explains, settling on his haunches on the floor as easily as a hunting hound at rest, leaning against Solas’ leg comfortably. “I couldn’t find the mother in time- She got quiet too fast. I helped the other little ones. They couldn’t make it to sleep by themselves, and they weren’t… They wouldn’t- “ Solas notices a tension in Coles shoulders, although his face is currently hidden both by the angle of his hat, and the way he turns away. “I couldn’t help them. Get better.”

 

Of course not.

 

“Well.” Solas begins carefully, feeding another few drops to the kitten in the taut and fragile silence, feeling it’s small, sharp teeth suck eagerly. He’s not surprised to see there’s not much of a difference between Cole drunk and Cole sober, after a few glasses of (hopefully, if he knows Iron Bull and Varric at all) watered down maras-lok. The young spirit has always been a very open, gentle soul; The only difference now is his propensity to the maudlin. “You can’t help everyone. It is simply part of being human.”

 

Cole remains silent.

 

“I’m sure Sera would love to have a pet. Now that she has a home to have one.” He settles on, nudging Cole with his leg. “Now. You should be off to bed. It’s traditional after a night of drinking to, as the Iron Bull would say, sleep it off.”

“Dorian gave me water.” Cole mumbles into his knees, tucking his head down further.

“Yes, I’m sure.” Solas realizes after a few more moments that Cole has no intention of leaving. “If you like, my room is right across the hall. I know you probably don’t have a bed yet-“

 

“I can use it?” Cole finally blinks up at him, nose slightly red.

 

“Of course. I have to go get some milk and, see if anyone in the stable has some nursing formula.” Animals were orphaned fairly often, and it wasn’t unheard of to either get milk from another nursing animal, or get a mixed powder from the alchemist. “I won’t be using it for awhile.”

 

Solas helps Cole to bed, although he’s very steady for someone drunk enough to have forgotten how to use Solas’ doorknob. After he’s finished there- and placed Cole’s hat on the bedpost where he could have it on hand- he tucks the kitten into the voluminous pocket in the front of his robe where it purrs contently, and heads out into the dark night-time of Skyhold to see about getting supper for his newest little friend.

 

#####

 

The next day dawns bright and early, and he’s not alone in his headache at the breakfast table.

 

Bull is reclined against the far wall of the Grand Hall like some statue tipped on its side, eye closed and sides heaving in soft snores as he unconcernedly catches a few more minutes of shut eye before the Inquisitor drags him off to what is no doubt, another poorly disguised dragon hunt.

Dorian, luckily, is both used to nights of excess drinking as well as lucky enough not to be on a dragon slaying roster, and is cheerfully piling his plate with bacon and soft currant rolls, pressing them onto an unusually pale and fragile looking Cole. The spirit has his chin resting morosely on the table, and Solas idly thinks that if he continues to drape himself on furniture in such a careless manner, Madame Vivienne might catch him at it.

The thought seems to catch Cole by surprise, and he gives Solas a startled and vaguely alarmed stare, casting Madame Vivienne’s balcony a wary glance, before straightening and politely accepting the large and greasy breakfast Dorian puts in front of him.

 

“I understand you normally don’t eat, but you also don’t normally drink, and you _must_ soak all that poison up somehow.”

 

“Maras-lok is poison? I thought the Iron Bull said it would cure what ails you.”

 

“Iron Bull is a rogue and a liar and you shall not listen to anything the man says.”

 

“It’s true.” Bull replies sleepily, and Dorian rolls his eyes.

 

The mage is distracted from bullying breakfast into Cole by Solas’ odd behavior however, and throws him a curious glance. “I understand you’re ancient elven magics supposedly renders you immune to hangovers my friend, but whatever are you fidgeting around for?”

“As you might not know, Cole helped me solve my little problem last night.” Solas explains briefly, tucking a hand down to settle the kitten who seems content to sleep in his pocket for the foreseeable future. It’s stomach is round and tight with milk, although it’s ribs still show under the scraggy orange fur and it’s whiskers have a decided zig zag to them. Solas knows it’s probably the near starvation that renders it so lethargic, but there’s still a small part of his heart that thaws at the little warmth in his lap, near his hip that rumbles with purrs.

 

“She likes the smell of your pockets.” Cole says, as he takes an uncertain nibble of bacon, making a face and staring pleadingly at Dorian.

 

Dorian sternly motions for him to continue, before turning to give Solas a curious once over. “My memory is vague. Tell me, what did you decide on? And what, for fucks sake, is in your pockets.”

 

Solas retrieves the kitten from his pocket, and holds her up, blinking her large cornflower blue eyes and yawning a small, sharp toothed yawn that ends in a chirrup. Kittens are all born with blue eyes, and Solas idly wonders what color they will be when she grows up. Perhaps yellow. Or brown, like Sera’s, might be appropriate.

 

“Holy shit.” Bull sits up the rest of the way, sleep forgotten, and a look of heady delight on his face. “Kosslun’s balls, that is the cutest thing I have ever seen in my life. Give it here.”

He surrenders his newest friend with a roll of his eyes, as Bull and Dorian both crowd in to coddle the little beast, and Solas almost burns with embarrassment _for_ them as a few Chantry sisters give them odd looks and concerned whispers. He knows that Bull doesn't care about his image, but he's almost certain Dorian will be embarrassed at having damaged his aloof persona in such a fashion.

“I do so love cats. I had three when I lived in the Mintharous circle.” Dorian sighs, after the two of them combine efforts to dazzle the kitten with strokes and pets and coddling.

“I thought you were allergic?” Bull commented drily, his large hands almost engulfing the tiny orange scrap. She doesn’t seem concerned, and simply meows loudly and hugely for food, gnawing lightly on Bull’s large scarred finger.

 

“Yes, of course, they were hairless. Don’t give me that look Cole, they were _born_ that way and quite happy about it as well. Now finish your bacon.”

 

“If I didn’t know Sera, I’d say you were going to get the shit laid out of you.” Bull says seriously, giving the kitten back to Solas, who quiets it with a few strokes, and tucks it into his lap. He’s going to have to feed her again before he goes out to find Sera, and make sure he has enough food to give to her for feedings.

 

“Please don’t try to put me off, I’ve made up my mind.” Solas sighs, a little miserably.

 

They finish their breakfast in relative silence, Cole pushing his food around sullenly, before turning to give Dorian a bewildered look.

 

“Why would you give a cat a sweater, Dorian?”

 

#####

 

The moment of truth comes when Solas finds Sera out by the training field, a dummy liberally prickling with arrows leaning lopsidedly against the back of the ramparts where none of the other soldiers will go to train. Sera has been known to train in volatile, and mildly explosive ways, sometimes involving bees. This is not so conducive to team work, unless you were one of her regular companions.

 

“Balls!”

 

One of her arrows thunks solidly into the dummy, masking the sound of his footsteps. I strikes near the bristling patch already forming on the things head, slightly morbid looking. Solas makes sure to stay quiet as he approaches, so as to not have her bounding off. It’s not too dissimilar to hunting.

Another arrow thunks solidly, and this time there’s a crunch of splitting wood as she splits an arrow lodged in the dummy’s head from the fletching, driving it back and almost snapping it off at it’s thin and wobbly neck.

 

“Yes! Suck an arrow for _real_ , you stupid log.”

 

“I believe this is what Trevelyan means, when he tells you that your methods can sometimes be, how did he put it? Over kill.”

 

He expects her to whirl around, but instead she doesn’t take her eyes off of her target, stepping in that graceful, and surprisingly sure-footed way she has when her bow was up and draw was back, arrow entirely unmoving. She does spit off to the side, hugely and rather noisily.

She steps sideways a few paces, and lets go.

This time, the arrow strikes decidedly lower on the dummy’s anatomy, and Solas thinks he’s not alone in his slight wince, if the way one of the few soldiers hanging around starts hurrying away is any indication.

 

“Alright.” She puts the bow down. “Let’s get this shite straight, I don’t care what kind of bet you have going with small ball and in charge. I’m not mouth breathing with you, I’m _not_ kissing you, and if you don’t leave off with this whole thing I’m going to shove so much arrow up your arse, you’re going to be shitting tree’s for a-" She breaks off, and Solas makes a small mental note fo the date for future reference. He has yet to be able to strike Sera silent, and he thinks it might be an accomplishment that will only be rivaled when they finally defeat Corypheus. "What’s that.”

 

Solas holds the tiny cat up like a shield, suddenly unsure.

 

He clears his throat. “Ah. It’s a… Bribe?”

 

Sera’s frozen, her formerly angry gaze softened slightly into something like confusion, ears laid back slightly in a parody of the cat currently dangling from Solas’ grip.

 

“… That’s for me?

 

“If you would like.”

 

She’s silent for a few more leaden moments, and Solas almost says something to break the silence. He doesn’t have to, as the kitten offers a sleepy and enquiring meow, and Sera moves forward as carefully as the quarry Solas has been imagining her to be this entire time. Her bow dangles from her grip as if forgotten.

“Why the- What- Why would you think I want a mangy cat?” She reaches out a careful hand, and stops before she touches the fur, drawing it back as if scared to touch. “And look, it’s all stupid looking. And. And it looks sick.”

“She’s simply hungry- I have food for her." He explains, his arms starting to grow tingly with the effort of holding them out for so long. "You would have to feed her every four hours or so.”

Sera opens her mouth, but it seems for once she is speechless, and with a sudden surge of bravery Solas slowly thrusts the cat into her arms. Rather than drop it, she lets her bow thump to the ground, face twisted up as if he just handed her something priceless and valuable and is suddenly faced with an enormous amount of trepidation.

“And you want a kiss.” She finishes, her eyes fixed on the little purring cat that is currently investigating her belt and leather armor with an inquisitive nose, small pink nostrils quivering and delicate claws hooked into her sleeves. “A slimy snog for this-” She breaks off, as if unsure of what to call it, and hesitantly, she pets it on the back.

 

The cat immediately arches into the touch, rubbing it’s head on her stomach and purring loudly enough that Solas smiles.

 

“I have no need for a cat. It is yours whether or not I complete my bet- But. I would very much appreciate it.”

 

“Here, what makes you think _I_ have time for a cat? Think I’m not busy or something? Like I don’t got shite to do?” She starts venomously, bristling.

 

“I think that you like helping the helpless. And Jenny here is nothing if not helpless.“

 

Sera looks stricken. “You named her Jenny?”

 

Solas decided not to mention the fact that it was Cole who named her, and shrugs. “She does look rather red, does she not?”

 

Sera looks down at the little cat, and with the careful and precise movements of someone holding an easily crushable piece of glass, brings it up to tuck under her chin. Jenny purrs loudly and cheerfully nips at her chin with tiny kitten teeth, suddenly in the mood to play after multiple feedings, and a long hibernation in the depths of Solas pocket. She leave tiny scratches, but Sera doesn’t seem like she minds as she drapes it over her shoulder like a noblewoman fine fur stole.

 

She strokes it like a mother would her child, and looks embarrassingly red and pleased.

 

“Alright. You’ve done me a good favor, and I suppose I could stand the stink for one second.” She announces airily, and Solas pretends he doesn’t notice the whitening around her knuckles, and the way her eyes are faintly glassy.

This armistice is fragile, so Solas refrains from saying anything involving baths and the number there-of, and instead steps forward. Sera grabs him roughly by the shoulders, and Solas tolerates it.

“Listen, I’m going to shut my eyes and pretend you’re like, one of them giant Iron Bull lookin' women, alright? So you shut _your_ eyes, and try to think _horns._ And if you ever mention this again,” She says dangerously, the cat rumbling cheerfully from under her chin like a furry violin. “I’m going to tattoo your arse to the back of your head.”

 

Solas rolls his eyes, but nods. 

 

The kiss is perfunctory, brisk, and Sera spits in his mouth.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ######
> 
>  
> 
> Whoo boy this one gave me more trouble than the Cullen one did. I spent HOURS yesterday trying to think on this, but finally, when I had practically nothing to show for it, I erased everything, started over, and managed to hammer this out. I realize this was the one a lot of people were most looking forward to, and I hope I don't disappoint!
> 
> Notes on this, first off, I love the theory floating around that Sera is more than she looks. And after reading through all that dialogue, I DO get a sort of creeping feeling that something about Sera isn't entirely normal. Also, more Cole!
> 
>  
> 
> The only way I could think of to get Sera to kiss him, was either flattery, or bribery. And then I started thinking about what Sera would like, and I thought, aw. Kitten. I'm such a fucking ham I'm sorry.


	12. The Inquisitor (The Real Bet)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! Every single note made this fic happen, because comments only feed me.
> 
> I know everyone has an Inquisitor they love, and yes, this is mine. His name is Cooper and he's a Templar and he romanced Dorian and I love him.
> 
> This was a very fun prompt, and probably one of the first fics I tried to take seriously. It was a fun ride and I guarantee you I was drunk for half of it.
> 
> Once again, I think I've said it before, this has absolutely minimal editing (like, two readthroughs) and no beta, so any mistakes I am happy to fix! I can't thank you guys enough! I may not be able to answer every single comment anymore, but rest assured, I save them for months just to give me a little boost at some point during a bad day.
> 
> :')

######

The dragon lay on the ground, sides still heaving with the paroxysms of it’s dying rattle, and Solas wipes the sweat from his forehead, limbs trembling with exhaustion. Although the wind is gusting heavily, enough to plaster his robes to his legs, the sand is damp and he’s grateful he doesn’t have to combat it in his eyes. 

 

They’d had enough of that in the Hissing Wastes.

 

There’s a whoop of pure joy from the other side of the beast- an almost cobalt blue thing, caked grimy from the beach sand and steely in the stormy lighting- and Solas is treated to the full glorious sight of the Iron Bull, covered in gore up to his horns and grinning a wide and exultant smile. His teeth are sharp and speckled with blood from his own mouth, where he bit through his tongue on a particularly hard blow from one immense clawed forearm.

“Holy _shit_.” Solas tries to catch his breath while the Bull practically _bounces_ over to him. “That was _incredible!_ Did you see me jump it’s tail? That sexy bastard son of a bitch almost got me- Look!” Iron Bull props his axe up against his ribs, the handle tall enough to rest comfortably, and presents Solas with a swollen and rather twisted looking wrist.

It’s an odd olive green under the greyish-copper of Iron Bull’s skin. It does not look healthy. Nor comfortable. “I hit that boulder and broke my wrist!” He sighs like a lover presented with a token, and Solas refrains from curling his lip. Barely. _“Fantastic!”_

His pupils are dilated still with the Reaver haze, a smell like hot metal wafting over them as Solas slowly and carefully finishes approaching Bull himself, sure not to move too suddenly while projecting an air of professional and perfunctory concern. That wrist does not look well, and he knows that as a rule Bull doesn’t feel pain until well after it happens. He’s still not sure whether it’s a personal quirk, a cultural one, or inherited.

“And you thought not to mention it until _after_ the battle? I’m sure it’s not my barriers that failed, so I’m assuming you just maneuvered carelessly. _More_ carelessly than usual, I should say.”

Solas takes one great wrist in his hand, keeping the touch light. The Iron Bull is fever warm and slick with blood and sweat, clean streaks through the red like a watershed on his shoulders and back. The smell coming off of him reminds him once again of the stables, and he flicks an ear irritably.

“I’ll show _you_ a careless maneuver.” Bull rumbles with another flash of pointed teeth, not helping matters. His warm breath wafts down over Solas tilted face, and he stops Bull with a single tightened grip on the shattered bone and a pointed glare.

 

Now is most definitely not the time.

 

Bull only subsides with a low rumble of agitation. Thankfully the fever seems to slowly be leaving his body the longer Solas drags out the inspection and subsequent healing, and his shoulders lower as the pain of his injuries and the exhaustion pierces his haze of heady battlelust.

He’s been known to get excited, after a battle. Generally Cooper is happy to work off some of the energy with some rather energetic roughhousing, bordering on flat out brawling. Solas suspects he often suffers from the same affliction, and it’s…. A trial, being out with both of them at once. But he seems to be out of sight for the moment- No doubt observing some interesting rock or plant he’s going to drag with them all the way back to Skyhold.

“Shattered, but mending, like a cool green river of light. Bones are like stones, and they never forget.” Cole points out quietly, as he approaches them at his odd shambling gait, half a wolfish stroll and half an uncertain slink. Solas looks him over, but he doesn’t appear to be limping from anything more than his mismatched shoes.

There was a grace to Cole, even limping, and half singed with electrical burns and sodden with rain. He’d been a furious blur in the fight, and Solas is certain for a fact that the same tail Bull had jumped had hit the rogue, sending him flying like piece of dirty laundry.

Luckily it appears he’s none the worse for the wear, the sand having broken most of his fall- where a boulder had instead shattered Bull’s wrist. Luck was a funny thing.

“There’s always remnants of a break, even after healing with magic. You’re correct. And the Iron Bull happens to have a more rugged skeletal map than most.” Solas adds, mostly to encourage Cole when his disjointed sentences make more sense than usual. He doesn’t mind translating the spirit- Not when it seems important to him to make himself heard.

 

“He thinks you look attractive when you hurt him.” Cole also says, conspiratorially, looking unbothered as he gives the place where Solas touches Iron Bull’s wrist an interested look.

 

Solas gives Bull a glare as the last rush of healing magic goes out from him, and to his credit, Bull looks sheepish.

 

“Where’s our fearless leader gotten to?” In a bid perhaps to change the subject, Bull glances around, drawing his arm back and testing the wrist casually. It bends perfectly, Solas notes with a critical eye, although there is the faint popping of air leaving the newly aligned cartilage that sounds dramatically loud in the sudden silence of the windswept beach. A space between gusts and pounding rain. “Last I saw he was trying to headbutt it.”

“He did.” Cole sighs morosely. He’s rubbing the edge of his knife on the leg of his trousers fitfully, smearing blood across. When you have a beast half the size of a small village, the blood really does get everywhere. “Now he’s hidden, silent, but still safe. He needs us to dig him out. His head hurts.”

Solas looks from Cole, brow furrowed faintly in puzzlement, and slowly casts his gaze back towards the dragon.

 

He thinks he can hear muffled, rhythmic thumping.

 

“I’m buying him so many drinks.” Bull sighs, as the same realization hits him, and he begins to stretch his newly healed arm behind his back as they approach the giant beast. He stretches it the other way, grasping his elbow, and bending faintly forward to limber up the broad, lean line of his back. “And why the hell didn’t you say anything kid?”

“You hurt more. Cooper is _trapped,_ dark pressing in, but it never bothered him before now, and it won’t. He knows we will come to get him.” Cole, flustered by the exasperation in his companions gazes, adds lamely, “He made the killing blow, sundering through horn and into her eye, her skull crunching like the last ice of winter. He _wanted_ to be under her.“ If Solas didn’t know better, he’s think the spirit sounded _defensive._

“Well I guess if that’s what it took.” Bull sighs, rounding the dragons still warm corpse, and locating the spot in the soft sand where it looks most likely. There’s a depression in the sand leading underneath the slightly less armored belly, and some marked scuffles in the dirt. The scales are torn and ragged where they used to shingle neatly, and Solas thinks it’s probably Cole’s wicked and talon-like daggers that did it, the miasma of blood magic and misery wafting around them causing the wounds to bleed even after the heart has stopped pumping. It stains the soaked sand an even darker shade.

 

(Cooper had found them in a temple, and although Cole had looked uncertain at the darkly enchanted things, he seemed to enjoy how well they jumped to the task of cutting through bone and sinew. Especially when the people he was cutting through were... Lacking a compassionate instinct.)

 

Dragons, while large and immensely powerful, are notoriously light boned. They had to be in order to lift their immense size off of the ground, even with the assistance of fade-touched ambient magic.

And Iron Bull is really rather ridiculously strong. It doesn’t hurt that Scout Harding and a few of her assistants wander down from the safety of the forest line, and lay their bows aside to lend a hand. Most of them are light boned dwarves and elves, rangy things, but when it’s their Herald pinned underneath the dragon they give an effort worth twice the number.

 

With the combination of Cole’s less than effective direction, Bull’s straining muscles, and Solas’ _slightly_ more effective magical assistance, the great bulk of the corpse is moved enough for Cole to duck under, and drag Trevelyan out with his hands hooked under the less armored joint of his arm pits, mouth and nose bleeding heavily and a dazed look in his eyes. There’s sand all in the coppery brown of his hair, and he spits off to the side, sniffing wetly and blowing more blood down his front as he finally gets a full breath of fresh air.

The weight would have crushed someone else, but their Inquisitors armor is dragon bone- Possibly the only thing in existence actually _meant_ to stand under the weight of an entire High Dragon. It kept his bones from shattering and lungs from collapsing- although the shallow and limited breaths he’d been allowed were not enough, if the pale and shaky way he swoons against Bull’s chest after they prop him up is any measure.

Solas thanks the sky briefly that he hadn’t been _killed._ Although he supposes that Cole would have kicked up more of a fuss if the Inquisitor had fallen in anything less than the Cooper-sized divot in the sand that had protected him from being crushed. It looks as if the battle had gouged enough large trenches and holes in the battlefield to have made it possible- Solas remembers having to jump over them in the fight, or risk a twisted ankle.

 

Now he’s grateful. 

 

“Did we win?”

 

“That’s right buddy, we sure did,” Bull slung an arm under Cooper’s shoulders, taking the Templar’s weight. His feet drag furrows in the sand as he barely manages to get his feet under him. Bull doesn’t seem to notice. “And I have to say, I’ve never seen someone headbutt a dragon before- Sure gets the blood pumping. How’s your head feeling killer?”

“I- I’m not sure. Is it still there?” Cooper blinks dazedly and touches his forehead with hesitant fingers, his gauntlet missing it’s mark and patting his cheek instead. It leaves a streak of grime and blood; Solas wipes it away on the edge of his sleeve, with a heavily aggrieved sigh and a pointed push of the filthy humans hand away from his face.

“Still there, still handsome. That dragon honest to god did not know what to do with you. Shit, _I_ don’t know what to do with you, you big idiot.” Cooper seems hurt by the fact, and vaguely confused as to which direction they were supposed to be walking. “Let’s get you to the healers.” 

 

“Ask him.” Cole touches Solas shoulder as they weave their way back up the way they’d came, and Solas turns his concerned eyes away from their Inquisitor, and back to Cole. They’ll come back for the body later, to disassemble.

He seems intent, pale gaze staring at some point just over Solas shoulder and mouth moving silently for a moment, before concentrating again onto Solas. Who waits patiently for him to center his thoughts. “You never agreed on a day, but there’s one marked on a calendar that Varric is waiting for. He has a bottle of wine, and he wants you to know there’s no hard feelings.”

 

_Fenedhis._ Solas flicks an ear in irritation, and sighs.

 

“Hold on one moment.” Solas dismisses the scouts who were following with a nod, and with a dubious look, Harding leads her men away with a shouted order and a briskly clapped hand, scooping her bow up and leading the way back to where they’d left the supply caravans.

 

Camp had barely been in sight when the dragon had swooped in low, and there’d been no discouraging young Trevelyan when the screech had rattled the tree tops and rung their ears.  
(Him and the Iron Bull together were incorrigible. It was like having not one, but two badly behaved hunting hounds- Both of whom were very good at their jobs, but tore the couch apart every time you left the house.) “I’ll take care of the healing.”

 

Solas helps Iron Bull lead Cooper to the edge of the clearing, setting him down with careful and deft hands, making note of yet another set of armor dented into needing repairs, and big clumsy hands dragging on his sleeves.

“Easy big guy. Kossluns balls, how hard did you hit your head?” Iron Bull commented, slowing the Inquisitors descent to the point where he didn’t bruise his tailbone.

“Hit my what?” Cooper blinks vaguely at Bull, and then waves him off, removing his weapon long enough to sit fully on the sandy scrub-life of the coast without his enormous greatsword getting in the way.

“As I said, I’ll take care of this.” Healing magic is not Solas’ forte, but he’s not a complete incompetent. If pushed into a corner, he might venture to say he was better than any back-woods Chantry-fed hedgewitch they had hiding in a tent at camp. Anyone who lives out by themselves learns fast how to heal when they get sick, or twist an ankle fifty miles from the nearest human settlement. ( _Human_ settlement.)

The well of his mana scrapes roughly against the channels he’s drawing it through, and even though it’s probably his imagination, his palms seem to steam faintly in the damp cold of the Storm Coast. He _is_ rather tired. Rain trickles off of his nose, and his sleeves slap wetly against Cooper’s armor as he loosens his gorget and checks his pulse.

“Solas, what are we doing in the library?”

Solas ignores this, and pushes Cooper’s hand away again as it attempts to test the depth perception between himself and Solas’ face. “Cole, you did not mention he was concussed quite so badly.”

“He seemed alright.” Cole says, still surprisingly unconcerned, for him. He does however sit down next to Cooper as if he belongs there, leaning against the Inquisitor’s bent knees like a faithful hound, and watching Solas work intently.

“Hm. Yes, this does seem rather less urgent than Bull’s wrist.” _That_ had been shattered clear through. As Solas extends his senses, he can tell that although there’s some faint swelling in the cranial cavity that he shrinks down, and a tooth that he regrows, it’s mostly bumps and bruises and a broken nose.

He straightens the nose with an extra trickle of magic, causing Cooper’s eyes to water and his teeth to grit as his eyes start to clear from the daze and the pins and needles of healing magic finish sobering him up. It seems to look just as broken as before when he’s through. With the habit of headbutting enemies who get to close, Solas is not surprised that it’s permanent state is that of a brawlers.

 

“Can you tell me what year it is?” He asks, while feeling tentatively along the bridge of his nose and brow.

 

Cooper squints against the rain coming from the sky, dripping fat and heavy off of the lush green of the tree above them. Things grow surprisingly well on the Storm Coast, where it wasn’t rock and shale. “9:41? I think. It’s not 9:42 yet, is it?”

“No. Do you mind if I check your motor skills?” Solas can’t see Bull, but he can see his shadow cast next to the Inquisitor in front of him, the weak sunlight outlining his shoulders and the jut of his pauldron. Cooper doesn’t seem to notice, blinking placidly up at him.

His heart thuds uncomfortably, but he’s fond of Cooper. And knows that every time he gets the best of in cards and has to walk back to his rooms only partially clothed, he takes it in good humour.

“Of course. But I think I’m alright now-”

Solas leans forward and gives the Inquisitor a very pointed look.

Cooper trails off, and his eyebrows go up as Solas dips down very, very slowly, ears laid back in irritation at the subsonic growl of delight coming from Bull. He’d turn and glare, but if he does, he’d probably not have the courage to do this again.

 

He should have timed this better.

 

Solas sees the dawning realization on Cooper’s face, the dart of his gaze from Solas’ mouth up to his eyes.

 

And then there’s the wide puppy-like grin as he reaches forward, with still grimy and bloody gauntlets to catch the damp front of Solas’ robe, and smash his face enthusiastically into his.

 

He can’t sigh very well with someone’s tongue in his mouth, but Solas makes the effort.

 

Cooper’s face is shaven, a holdover from a chantry upbringing, and he’s- Well. Enthusiastic. It’s a relief not to have to deal with beard burn for once.

His hands are tight, and although it’s messy and still smells like a charnel house, Solas supposes they all do after rolling around on the battlefield.

Cooper has revealed the little experience he’d had with- Well. Anyone, really. But Solas finds himself pleasantly surprised by the enjoyment he gets out of the kiss, gentle and smooth and just the right amount of damp and sharp against his lips and tongue. Better than any of the ladies if he’s being honest, but not nearly as skilled as the iron Bull is.

He attempts to gentle it, drawing back, but Cooper makes a small noise of negation in his throat and nips at the soft skin around his mouth, as his fists draw Solas body almost parallel to his where he’s almost completely lying on the ground.

His teeth close almost on Solas’ chin before making his way back up, sealing the surprised grunt in between the two of them. He thinks perhaps Cooper is interested in his slightly pointed teeth, because he keeps coming back to them. Solas is fondly exasperated. It’s rather like kissing a dog.

If a dog could kiss.

 

Solas gives as good as he can, prepared at this point, and resigned to giving rather more effort than he’d been ready to when he’d made this bet. If he didn’t know any better, he’d say-

 

He’d say...

 

Something clicks.

 

Solas finally manages to disentangle himself, reaching back after his mouth is free and gently shoving the Iron Bull back another few steps. (The whole time they’d been kissing, the Reaver had drifted slowly forward until his knee was practically bumping into Solas back.)

“If you please.” Cole is sitting off to the side, displaced by Cooper’s enthusiasm, and looking pleased. As much as Cole can look pleased about anything.

 

“What’s the amount?”

 

“Amount of what?” Bull asks innocently, but the sudden guilty flush stealing over Cooper’s face down to where his neck is revealed by his loosened armor tells Solas everything he needs to know. It’s as if they’re playing cards all over again. For money. Which they’ve been doing all along.

 

“Alright, don’t tell me.” Solas bats Cooper’s hand away. “But tell me who’s winning?”

 

Bull opens his mouth, no doubt to lie, but Cole beats him to it without even looking up from where his fingers are tangling with each other. “The Iron Bull is winning, but he wants to try again because he liked it.” He says, and the Iron Bull only grins wider with a belly laugh.

 

The rain has almost entirely washed the blood off of him, although there’s still crescent traces in the crease of his elbows and under his ribs. “I don’t want to play, really. It was honestly just privilege-”

 

“I am not surprised.” Solas interrupts, before Bull says something to irritate him beyond all repair. “A betting pool to see who would be the best kisser then?” Solas wipes his mouth on the back of his sleeve and gets up with a sigh, pushing off of Cooper’s knees.

 

“Well. If I’m to declare a winner then, I think it would have to be-”

 

Cole gasps preemptively, a slow pleased smile spreading across his face.

 

“-Yes, it’s you Cole.”

 

“What!” Bull looks a combination of hilariously outraged, and delighted, as the rain comes down and the scouts finish saddling the horses back at the small hunting trail crossroads.

Cooper’s already laughing, attempting to push himself up off of the ground so they can leave with the rest of the scouts. It’s slow progress- He’s wearing rather a lot of armor.

“How did he beat me?!”

Solas pats Bull on his now clean chest, perfunctory, and starts leading the way down the slope back to the beach. Cole follows at a slide, uncaring of the mud getting on his clothes, or the gravel that slides down after him.

 

“Well you didn’t bring me any gifts, now did you?”

 

#####

**Author's Note:**

> For this prompt on the kinkmeme. ((http://dragonage-kink.livejournal.com/15060.html?thread=59572692#t59572692)) I've never written Solas before. :') 
> 
>  
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X6_ubiAzoSk


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